


Four Idiots in a Gazebo

by miyaji_08



Series: Seventh Sense Climbing [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Demons, M/M, Multi, Vampires, Werewolves, Witches, i only tagged characters with plot significance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:34:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 35,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22027900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miyaji_08/pseuds/miyaji_08
Summary: Kuroo just wants one year. One year where there's no mind control, no crazy dead-brother assassins, no demons coming to kill them. Just one normal year. Is that too much to ask for?
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou, Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou/Kuroo Tetsurou/Oikawa Tooru, Akaashi Keiji/Kuroo Tetsurou, Akaashi Keiji/Oikawa Tooru, Bokuto Koutarou/Kuroo Tetsurou, Bokuto Koutarou/Oikawa Tooru, Iwaizumi Hajime & Oikawa Tooru, Kozume Kenma & Kuroo Tetsurou, Kuroo Tetsurou/Oikawa Tooru
Series: Seventh Sense Climbing [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/469819
Comments: 49
Kudos: 160





	Four Idiots in a Gazebo

**Author's Note:**

> Happy new years, whenever yours is :)

There are sixteen little white pieces scattered on the board. The light cannot reach them even as slender fingers pick one up and toss it aside. She lets her nails drag against the stone the board lays on. 

Fifteen pieces. She plucks two pawns up from the board and curls her hand until they sift through it as pearlescent sand. 

Thirteen pieces. She takes her queen and throws it to the void. 

There are sixteen little black pieces on the other side. The enemy’s side. _His_ side.

Oh, how she longs to see him again. Every moment of agony that she waits is eclipsed only by her fear of what is to come.

She has lived for a very, very long time.

She moves her king forward a space and takes a breath. Her pieces, fewer than the black, are scattered over the board. The black are steadfast. They hold fort at the other end of the board, bathed in moonlight.

The black rook in the corner edges forward, nudged by an invisible hand. The progress is slow. It creeps over the board at an infinitesimally slow pace.

That’s alright, she thinks. 

She likes waiting.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Oikawa stumbles across the house for the first time, he’s terrified out of his mind. Out in the distance he can hear Ushijima’s underlings picking apart the woods. Dry leaves crackle under his bare, bloody feet and he darts up the steps of the house and flings the door open. The lock buckles under the force of his pull. Dust billows out into his face and Oikawa takes a couple steps back, throwing a hand up to cover his face.

Once the cold October wind pulls the dust away Oikawa makes his way inside and looks around.

It’s…drab.

Whoever the previous owner was, they took mildly good care of the place at best. It’s a western style, but he can see the faint lines in the wood where tatami mats protected it from sun damage; there’s faint swirls of calligraphy over half-disintegrated paper on a cobwebbed table in the hall. 

He doesn’t touch anything. His bare feet leave bloody footprints on the floor as he walks around.

The glass windows are thicker at the bottom than the top. He sees a set of stairs and makes his way up them, spikes of adrenaline rushing up his spine at every creak. It’s only when he’s at the top of the stairs, fingernails digging curves into his clenched fists, that he dares to look out the window.

They’re…

They’re not coming near the house.

One of the blasphemies stares at it from the edge of the trees, scanning, before shrugging and moving on. As though they can’t even see anything, as though Oikawa’s not staring down at them from the second story of a ratty but sizable abode.

Too tired to think about why that is, Oikawa leans against the wall by the window and slides to the ground. He can feel a tugging in his gut—probably Iwaizumi’s magic, still trying to draw the two of them back together. And he can still imagine the look on that little demon’s face, shackles weighing down his bony ankles as Ushijima roared in anger at Oikawa’s betrayal. _Kunimi_. Oikawa hopes he’s ok.

He passes out with Kunimi’s terrified expression burned into his eyelids.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Fingertips roll over the smooth oak table with little clicks, sending shivers down Kuroo’s spine. He glances around the rest of the table and sizes up the others with cold, carefully expressionless eyes. 

Nekomata is at the head of the table. For someone so short and plump, he has a definitively menacing aura surrounding him, bleeding into the crinkles in the corners of his eyes and the way his mouth slides into a smile. It feels like a hungry panther watching over them all, taking in every single movement and cataloguing it _just in case_. His henchmen—as cheesy as it is to call them that—are littered around the room, all dressed in black suits and sporting some piece of a silver watch. Kuroo’s own sits heavy in his pocket, a skeleton pocket watch crafted specifically for him. The date of his orientation is pressed firm into the metal.

Lev stands behind Yaku’s chair, directly across from Kuroo and one empty chair away from Nekomata. The Russian shifts from foot to foot as though uncomfortable—the way the chain on his wrist cuff is taut in Yaku’s hold, Kuroo wouldn’t doubt it—but his body remains totally in tune to his ‘partner’. 

Kuroo grits his teeth. _Why did he bring Lev?_ It’s a danger to their plan; if Nekomata catches even the slightest hint of empathy between the pair, it’s over for all of them. For it to end now would just be—

“Tetsurou.” Nekomata mutters, and Kuroo stands and shifts close to the elder. Nekomata lets his calloused hand brush over the hunter’s wrist before gripping tight and yanking, forcing Kuroo to his knees. The hand grips one side of Kuroo’s neck, angling it to reveal the raised flesh under his jaw. Branded onto his skin, no bigger than a couple centimeters, are the letters _IX_. His id. Nekomata lets his fingers brush against them and Kuroo closes his eyes and shivers. “What a loyal boy. You are one of the only surviving hunters of your pedigree. Can I trust you with the next mission?”

Kuroo can’t nod and knows he’s not been asked to speak, so he remains motionless. After a long pause, he swallows, and Nekomata’s fingers drift lightly over Kuroo’s neck before settling onto the arm of the chair. 

“Good,” Nekomata’s voice is a low rumble, like a whisper from the shadows. Yaku— _X_ —is watching Kuroo emotionlessly from the chair, but his hands are clasped tightly together under the table. Kuroo is counting on him and Lev to come over to his apartment later and make sure he’s in the right headspace for whatever mission he’s about to be given.

“Good,” Nekomata repeats, leaning back in his chair. He nods, and Kuroo stands and moves back to his seat. “You all must have heard by now that there’s been a mass killing in the North. The survivor’s magic formed into a necromancy. Yaku, you and yours will go make sure he knows his place. And Kuroo—”

Kuroo listens to his orders diligently. He grits his teeth and listens to the orders to kill, to maim, to blackmail and fight and destroy. And he takes them. And he’ll do them.

For now.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Nothing. Grey noise in his ears, numb fingers, something that smells like burnt chicken. Akaashi can’t feel his feet. He can’t feel—

He blinks, and there are voices in his head that don’t exist and he looks down at his hands and finds them burnt. Someone is grabbing his shoulders, pulling him in, but he can’t feel them at all. As though he isn’t in his own body. He sees red eyes and feels something weighted like chains on his feet. Oh. He can feel them now. They hurt.

He looks up.

_My coven is dead._

Something wet. He looks up, realizes he’s outside. No—not outside. Around him, the remnants of the house flicker with the colors of embers, barely lit. He thinks—he thinks he sees a hand under the rubble.

He drags himself onto his side and vomits, but nothing comes out. When his stomach is done clenching he pulls himself upright and stares up at the sky.

_My coven is dead._

He looks back at the hand. It’s limp. One standing beam finally loses its stability and falls, crashing into the place where the body must be. The hand jerks up and flecks away in pieces of ash until there’s nothing left.

_One of them,_ he realizes. Not a witch. Not one of his…

He gets up. He’s vaguely aware of his injuries. He remembers what his mother screamed at him as she was dragged down the stairs, away away away. He closes his eyes and remembers the address. The safe house.

He starts walking.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Bokuto follows the scent to the edge of the ravine and looks down at how the dirt crumbles down the side of the cliff as he paws it. Oh well. He’ll bring his packmate home later. He turns a little as Yukie shifts and approaches. 

_He still doesn’t want to come home?_

Bokuto shakes his head and she lets out a huff through her nose and looks out at the rushing water. When he turns away she shifts back into her human form and begins picking her way along the cliff’s edge. 

“Think he fell?” She asks, observing the claw marks at the edges. Bokuto shrugs. “Hmm. Well, either way if he doesn’t answer to the sister pack they’ll hunt him down. It’ll end in blood.”

Bokuto shifts back. “I don’t know where he is, seriously.”

“I never said I thought you did.”

They stare at each other, at an impasse.

“You know, Bo, I never really thought being adopted into the main family pack suited you,” Yukie says after a moment. “You could do it if you wanted to, for sure, but…”

“What else am I supposed to do?!” Bokuto tugs at his hair in frustration. “What even can I do besides do what they ask of me?”

“Konoha would have—“

“Konoha betrayed the branch family, and now if we can’t catch him they’re going to hunt him like a wild animal.” 

“But he would be free.”

Bokuto laughs. “Free from what? From running for the rest of his life? From settling down? From starting a pack of his own? He can never do those things, they’ll always be searching for him.”

“I miss when the main branch family didn’t scare you,” Yukie says quietly. “That was when we all really started looking up to you.” He doesn’t reply. “You know, there’s another pack. In the North. It’s not led by a bloodline, and they’re supposed to be powerful. They’re supposed to be on good terms with Konoha’s brother.”

“So?”

“So, look at where we are, and where the pack house is.”

Bokuto glances up at the setting sun and then backwards. The pack house is south of where they are now.

“You think—“

“I think,” Yukie says carefully, “that you should wish so much to keep the main branch family’s honor, that you follow him. You hunt him relentlessly, day and night, so fast that none of the family’s henchmen can keep up. You go north. To find him.”

“And—what, disappear forever?”

He blinks and realizes that she’s already heading back into the forest.

“I’m not saying that at all,” she says breezily. “But it’s the North, Bokuto. People go missing up there all the time.” And then she’s gone. Bokuto stares back at the empty place where she used to be, and then shuffles closer to the edge of the cliff.

_I know you didn’t fall._

He takes a deep breath. 

North.

Right.

He jumps.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Oikawa picks up the pen. Taps it on the hardwood table. Clicks it open and closed a couple times. Blinks.

_There is a place where tracks meet the darkest forest in the universe._

“Uh, Oiks?” Bokuto peeks his head around the entrance of the hallway, eyes zeroing in on the empty pages in front of Oikawa. “Oh. Nevermind. Wow, that’s really not going well, is it?”

Oikawa picks up the papers and clutches them defensively to his chest. “I’m not an author,” he sniffs. “I’m a scientist. It’s much more impressive than spewing words on a page.”

Bokuto laughs. When he rounds the corner to fully enter the room, he has a sleeping Kunimi piggybacking him. Huffing a little from exertion, he stops by the couch to drop off his cargo before padding over to kiss Oikawa’s cheek. His lips are cold as they pepper over the side of Oikawa’s face.

“Keiji’s not gonna be happy about this,” he warns playfully. “But if you really can’t get anything done, we could always focus your energies on, ya know, other tasks.”

Oikawa gasps. “Why, Bo-chan, are you trying to get me in bed with you?” 

“I was sorta thinking you could make us some apple tarts. Or help me out with finishing the gazebo. But, like, whatever floats your boat.”

The demon smacks his boyfriend on the head, but it’s light, and they both grin at each other. Just as they finish pushing the empty journals and papers into the deep recesses of Kuroo’s Work Mess in the corner, safe where they cannot be found by a certain witch, Kuroo returns.

“I think I’m dying,” he tells them, walking in and draping himself over Kunimi. The little demon snorts in his sleep and wriggles around, trying to escape the icy body layered on him before opening his eyes and giving a hard shove. Kuroo yelps as he’s dumped onto the floor, gangly limbs flailing and smacking into the coffee table.

Oikawa and Bokuto share an amused look.

“Long day at work?”

“Thought I found a lead on an errant wolf,” Kuroo says. He cards his hand through his hair, expression dulling until it’s expressionless. “Damn thing keeps escaping me and I can’t figure out how.”

His boyfriends share another look.

“Want us to help?” Bokuto asks. “I mean, not to sound like an expert or something, but I know a lot about wolves.”

Kuroo rolls his eyes. “No. I don’t want you guys touching this shit with a ten foot pole, you hear me? Stay out of it.” He narrows his eyes at the looks on their faces. “I’m serious. Don’t look into this. You will be doing me the _opposite_ of a favor.”

“Oh, he thinks he’s so cool and mysterious, does he?” Oikawa asks loftily. “Rich, coming from the same vampire that almost burned himself with holy water during mass _twice_.”

“That’s not the same thing! That’s literally not my fault.”

“You could have gone with non-denominational and put your hand on your heart. But no,” Oikawa says, “you _had_ to pretend to be Catholic.”

“I don’t even know why ‘Kaashi likes that stupid church,” Kuroo grumbles. “Not like he’s Christian.”

Bokuto perks up. “But free food! And Kiyoko-chan goes! And Hinata! And—“

With his boyfriends successfully distracted, Kuroo takes a look out the window and takes a deep breath. Things really haven’t been going well at work, and Kenma’s gone for some reason or another. Even scoping out what’s going on with that baker—Futo-something?—is strangely difficult. Plus—

He stares at the shadowy figure standing just on the edge of the property and breathes in sharply, but as quickly as he notices it the figure is gone.

“So what’s on the plate for dinner tonight?” He asks casually, not taking his eyes off the window. Did he really see…?

“Not chicken,” both Oikawa and Bokuto chorus. Kuroo snorts and finally turns back to face them. 

“You look a little tired,” Bokuto says. “Are you drinking enough? Do you need more rest? Or sunlight? Do vampires even need su—“

“I’m good, Bo, just thinking. Remember when we all first met? It’s crazy to think we’ve come so far.”

Oikawa narrows his eyes like he knows exactly what Kuroo is doing, but after a pause he plays along.

“I remember thinking I was going to move in with three of the hottest people I have ever seen,” he sniffs. “And thinking that I was totally going to fall in love with at least two of them.”

“No way,” Bokuto gasps. “That’s like, telling the future. You _knew_.”

Kuroo laughs. “Sure he did,” he teases. “Just like he knew that he would end up dating _all_ of them.”

Oikawa pouts at him. “Let me have my fun. I totally knew I would end up with at least one of you. Thought it would be you, Kou, cause you’re so fun. Remember when you showed up? You thought there was a deadline for applications like it’s for a job or something. I thought it was super cute.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Kuroo stretches out his shoulders, popping them in and out. “Remind me again who turned away almost every chance he got at kissing us? We were fresh and ripe for the taking for, like, a month before finally _we_ made a move on _you_.”

“I dunno, I think killing Ushijima was a pretty big move,” Bokuto says casually. “It was pretty hot.”

Oikawa stares. “I literally _murdered_ someone.”

“Yep. Hot.” 

Kunimi looks supremely uncomfortable. He wiggles around on the couch and then escapes upstairs without a word, presumably heading to Oikawa’s room for a nap.

“Oh, wow,” Bokuto says, sidling up behind Kuroo and hugging him close, “look at that. Three hot men all alone in one room. What’re we gonna do about it?”

Kuroo flushes. He finally looks away from the windows, putting his hands over where Bokuto’s grip his hips. “Ko—“

“Shh,” Oikawa grins as he presses his chest to Kuroo’s. He leans forward and glances over Bokuto’s shoulder before pressing his lips gently to Kuroo’s neck. “Long day. Let me enjoy this.”

Bokuto lets out a rumbling laugh and pets at Kuroo’s sides, and Kuroo goes a little boneless. He doesn’t even realize when Bokuto starts walking them back until suddenly Kuroo is pressed into the couch. Oikawa straddles him and starts massaging out his back. 

“Oh my god,” he groans into the cushion. Bokuto sits near his head and starts petting his hair. “Oh my _god_.”

“Like a cat,” Oikawa muses. 

“Cute!” Bokuto agrees.

“Uh,” says Tsukishima, from the doorway. Kuroo’s so mellowed-out he doesn’t even react. “I’m just gonna…” The angel glances around wearily before hurrying up the stairs, presumably to Oikawa’s room.

“At this rate you won’t be able to sleep in your own bed tonight,” Kuroo laughs. Oikawa swats him on the hip.  
“Worth it. When are Hinata and Kageyama coming over? Is Dai-chan still too busy?”

“Dunno.” Kuroo stretches out a little bit and begins sitting up. He flits his eyes quickly over to the windows and then back. “Actually, uh, I—I—“ His tongue won’t _work_. “I—“

“I’m home!” Akaashi calls out from the doorway. “I brought takeout from the Thai place near the edge of town.” 

Bokuto eagerly scampers over to pepper Akaashi’s face in kisses as Oikawa helps carry the takeout bags to the counter. They unpack quietly for a moment before Oikawa pauses and turns back to Kuroo. The vampire is still on the couch, gazing over at them with distraught.

“Was there something you were gonna say?” Oikawa asks. He can’t remember if Kuroo was in the middle of something.

Kuroo blanches. He goes to turn his head but thinks better of it, meeting Oikawa’s observant gaze. The brunette has his thinking cap on, evident by the way he’s biting his lip, and Kuroo’s mind races as he processes. And suddenly, as if a wave were washing over his mind, thoughts come to him. He—he doesn’t want to worry them. He doesn’t want to be a bother. That’s all. It was nothing. He _saw_ nothing.

“It’s nothing,” he says easily. Slathers on a grin and heads over to the kitchen to join them. It is nothing. He saw nothing. He’s—

Nothing.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

There is a time between the darkness and sunrise when everything is still. Dew forms at the tips of trees, and spring slips into the corridors of winter with practiced ease. The dead shiver underneath their earthen blankets, ghostly fingers trailing under the slivers of grass beneath his feet.

This is the time that Futakuchi finds himself in most often. Trapped. Timeless.

He approaches the back of his bakery and balks. What…?

“Ivy,” he murmurs. It curls around his front door like a virus and he brushes its leaves. It grips tight to the worn brick of his little building. He runs his hands over the house and hisses angrily, and that is when he notices his door.

“No,” he whispers. “No, no, no—those fuckers.” He smooths his fingers over the burnt grooves of what was once a beautiful, solid oak door. It’s a scorch mark. A nasty one, at that. He breathes through his teeth and begins working his hands over it, upset. He’ll have to take sandpaper to it to get this sucker off.

Is she here for him again? After all this time? Or is he simply collateral in another hunt? He tries to think of the supernaturals he knows work nearby and can’t think of any until—

Oh. 

Well, fuck.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“How long does building a gazebo even take?” Oikawa complains. He’s in overalls he borrowed from Bokuto, who is currently sawing away at a long strip of wood. The base of the structure is mostly done, a solid fifteen feet in diameter. Frost clings to the edges of it.

Bokuto huffs out a laugh. “Seeing me working with all these big tools doesn’t do it for ya?”

“I can think of a few tools I’d prefer more.”

They both giggle as Bokuto goes back to the sawing. Oikawa picks at his sleeve. “I, um, I had a question for you.”

“Shoot.”

“So…you and Tetsu are a little closer than Kei-chan and I are with him. Not in a bad way or anything, but he’s just…he relaxes around you. And he just—sort of has been off lately? To me, at least. I think he might be hiding something but every time I try to give him the opportunity to talk about it he doesn’t.”

Bokuto stops sawing. “Glad I’m not the only one who noticed.” He runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t know what you and Keiji think makes up a ‘closer relationship’ than what we have with you guys, but that’s not it. And I’m a little hurt that you think that.”

“It’s not—that didn’t come out right. I’m sorry. I’m just…really worried.” Oikawa’s sentence trails off in a whisper and Bokuto walks over and hugs him close.

“I know,” he says gently. “I dunno what’s eating at him. But when he’s ready, he’ll talk to us.”

“What if he’s never ready? What if he never tells us? Is that—isn’t that like lying?”

“Listen.” Bokuto says firmly. “Tetsu loves us all so damn much. Sharing or not sharing something doesn’t change that. If he’s actively lying to us, or what he’s hiding actively involves us, then we have to trust that he’ll say something. But if it’s his own stuff—that’s kind of his own stuff to deal with, Tooru. We all are allowed to have our own things. Does that sound ok?”

Oikawa nods, but inside his mind is racing. Why would Bokuto say it like that? Does he have secrets of his own? Oikawa doesn’t—sure, he has things that he keeps to himself. But the big thing, the one he was truly afraid of saying, he laid it all out for them when he told them he was a demon. When he discovers things about himself he tells them nearly immediately, and if something happens he waits and analyzes but—but then he _tells them_. Do they all have things they’re not telling him? Are they all keeping secrets from him? It’s not a game of balances, but Oikawa sort of feels like now they have some sort of leverage over him.

“Tooru?” Bokuto asks. Oikawa blinks.

Who is he to judge? He spent so long lying to them about who he is, how can he now cast that stone? And worse, what if he does and he’s wrong?

“I—um, I’m gonna go see what Iwa-chan is up to.”

Bokuto searches his face. Frowns just a little. “I love you. Y’know?”

“I love you too.” Oikawa tries to sound reassuring. For Bokuto or for himself, he can’t quite figure out.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Akaashi is in a little bit of a pickle. He traces the grey scars of Ushijima’s fight with one hand, looking over his fingers and wrists. It’s strange. They barely even hurt anymore.

He’s in a library. A huge one, old and powerful, where he feels at home. Safe. He doesn’t have an official coven, no, and maybe they’re all—different. But he loves them all. 

That doesn’t put to ease the strange prickling sensation creeping up his spine. Something is wrong. He wishes he knew what.

“Well,” he tells himself. “Can’t get worse.” Probably. Hopefully. Maybe.

He decides to wander a bit, his gaze cascading over the towering shelves. Careful fingers drift over the carved wood and worn leather. Some of the books reach almost two feet in length; others barely match the size of his palm. They are old, new, vibrantly colored and muddled into gray. Many authors have chosen to forgo their names; even more of them leave symbols of their covens instead. Akaashi wonders what his own coven symbol could be. Thinks of what it was.

_Oh._

It’s the most beautiful thing, really. The largest book Akaashi has ever seen sits innocently on an oak bookstand just in front of the stain glass window. The window is arched, and the multicolored squares of glass scatter color over the warm red leather of the cover. There is a single gold symbol in the middle: two plain leafs overlapping on the sold part of a fan. A kamon? It’s not one that he’s ever seen before. He sways closer.

“Wow,” he breathes as he reaches out. When he brushes the cover it flies open and he stumbles back. The pages turn themselves one by one before settling on a blank page near the back. Akaashi hesitates and glances around to make sure no one is nearby before approaching. 

The moment he touches the page ink begins to fill it out, kanji he can’t recognize littering the pages. They skitter around haphazardly until he slams his hand down on the page, and then they settle. 

The title reads _**Covens of Peculiar Design**_. 

The rudimentary drawing in the corner is two figures holding hands. One bears the general crest of Witches. The other bears an x with a circle drawn atop: the symbol of death. _Demon_. The breath leaves Akaashi’s chest. This is what he’s been waiting for. This is what he’s been looking for. 

He’s so absorbed in the book that he misses the fleeting sensation of a hand at his neck; a figure curled against his back; a shadow whispering sweet words in his ear. He is so absorbed he misses himself—in the library as the sun sets and the moon rises, pouring over pages and pages of parchment only he can see.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Bokuto spends a lot of time on that stupid fucking gazebo. It’s so annoying—he dropped a pen on it and it rolled off, which is how he discovered that the entire platform wasn’t level. Yeesh. 

Now he sits on the uneven slats, drinking a beer and contemplating what Oikawa said. The night is cold—the frosty spring slinks around the forest like mist, with winter not yet ready to yield.

See, Bokuto doesn’t…think much. He tries to take people at face value because he knows how much people misread each other and cause unnecessary drama. He tries to trust people until they give him a reason not to. He waits for someone to finish before speaking.

Oikawa is different. He and Akaashi are very similar in that they take what people say and do very seriously. If they bring something up it’s because they’ve been thinking about it for a while, and when they act it’s thought out and usually has layers of messages they have no problem laying out for Bokuto later in words. Talking about what they think is happening helps them process when they’re being realistic and when they’re making assumptions. 

Kuroo, meanwhile, seems to be sort of in the middle of the spectrum. He thinks a lot, sure, but not usually about what people say towards him. He skirts around what he thinks they’re getting at, and then leaves it at that. He keys into the actions of a group rather than individuals, and generally tries to separate his empathy from his reactions to what people are saying.

So…

“He wouldn’t keep something important from us unless he has a reason,” Bokuto says aloud to himself. It’s true. He trusts all of his boyfriends innately and completely. But saying it sometimes—helps. “And I can try to be attentive to his needs, but I don’t need to push him for anything because I think if that’s what he needs he’ll come to us on his own.”

Besides, Oikawa could be basing the whole thing off of one brief experience. So Bo will just keep his eyes out, and if he really is concerned then they can all talk together as a group. They’re good at that. Kuroo won’t get worse, though; of that Bokuto’s 

“Hey.”

Bokuto turns. Tsukishima raises a hand in greeting, his other arm slung around Kunimi’s shoulders. They’re both tucked into some of Bokuto’s flannels. Cute.

“Hey there, kiddos,” he teases. “Either of you fancy helping me redo this platform tomorrow?”

Tsukishima raises an eyebrow. “It’s not done?”

“Broski. Look at this.” Bokuto fishes a pen out of his pocket and sets it on the platform, and they all watch it roll away. 

“Yikes.”

“You’re telling me,” he laughs. “But it should still be done well before summer. And Keiji’s made it so the wood won’t get bad when it rains, which is nice.”

“About that,” Tsukshima says. He glances over fondly when Kunimi nestles into his side. “Wasn’t he supposed to be home to make dinner tonight?”

Bokuto will never, _ever_ in his whole life tire of hearing Tsukki call them his home. God, this kids will be the death of him. “Uh, I think so? Why, what time is it? He might still be at the library.”

“Library?” Tsukishima frowns. 

“Yeah. Like, a magic one or something. He said he saw it when he was walking around town the other day, wanted to check it out.”

“A _magical_ library.” The demon’s voice becomes flat.

“Uh…yeah? Why? What time is it?”

Kunimi holds up his wrist to show off his watch (well, Kuroo’s watch, but really when it comes to the little demon what’s theirs is his). Almost nine-thirty.

“Oh, shit!” Bokuto says. “Well, you know Keiji and his books. He probably opened one up and got all caught up. Are my other hotties home? I’m sure we can order a pizza.”

Tsukishima raises an eyebrow as he holds out a hand to help Bokuto to his feet.

“Pizza isn’t healthy.” He says with uncalled-for disdain. “Eat a vegetable you freak. We’re demons, not garbage cans. And we can’t eat it if Akaashi isn’t here to enchant the food.”

“Yeesh!” Bokuto laughs. He squirms in-between them and swings his arms around their shoulders. “Then we’ll order a salad too! Besides, Tooru’s definitely been to the orchard lately so I bet he’s made some apple pie.”

He herds the little ones back into the house and is about to follow when he gets the strangest feeling. Like something is very, very wrong. He turns and that’s when he realizes it.

The forest is silent.

No birds, no animals, no wind brushing through the trees. It is eerily, abnormally silent. The sort of silence that suffocates, that curls into your skin and digs and digs until there is nothing left but a deep unsettled certainty. 

He makes sure to lock the door when he shuts it.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It’s three in the morning and Futakuchi has decided to clean up the old bar area behind the kitchen. He used to run some pretty potent shit during the prohibition, enough to make a mummy’s toes curl in distaste, but after that ended he didn’t feel like continuing it and focused more on his baking. Besides, alcohol is a longer process and he hates acquiring the voodoo stuff necessary to make all his stronger drinks. A good, working Gris-gris for the entire bar is way to fuckin’ expensive.

Yet here he is, pants rolled up to his knees and shirt to his elbows, scrubbing hard at the wood of the bar with his bristle-brush. The entire floor has been properly mopped, the wood slick beneath his toes. The windows have been opened. Stale air finally filters out. He reaches underneath the bar and starts pulling out the little bones and bits, gagging at the stench of rot. He throws them into the trash and closes his eyes for a minute.

A small hand digging into his wrist has him hissing and scrambling away, but he slips and ends up on his ass.

“Kenma, you bi—woah, hey, what’s up?”

Kenma looks terrifying, to say the least. His hair is jet black, his eyes are a stormy grey. In fact, his skin looks a little grey as well.

“Kenji,” he hisses. It fills the whole room. “ _Kenji_. They need you.”

“What?” Futakuchi asks. “What the fuck? Who? The fo—urgh!” He stumbles as Kenma literally drags him out of the bar and down the street. The bar door swings shut and locks on its own, the scorch marks long gone. 

“It’s repeating itself,” Kenma says very seriously. “You remember what happened before.”

Futakuchi blinks. _Kenma_ is worried? Not just sitting something out, or avoiding troublesome people, but worrying? Who could—

Oh. 

Oh, no.

“Fuck! Are you serious?” He asks, voice strangled as he jogs to keep up with Kenma’s pace. “I thought she—I—fuck! Kenma, this can’t—”

“She will drain them of everything if she gets the chance.”

Well, fuckity fuck fuck. Also, wait, “Does Legion know about her?”

Kenma shakes his head. “We came before any soul of Legion.”

“Well. Okay?” Futakuchi says, swallowing away the wash of memories and bloodshed. “Where are you dragging m—oh my fucking god, it’s them isn’t it, can they not stay out of trouble for five seconds?”

He turns to curse out Kenma but the smaller man is gone. Good lord does Futakuchi hate being a rook. He spins around trying to pick out Kenma in the empty storefronts, but no dice. He does, however, make out a slightly larger figure in the distance. Hunched over and wearing several layers of jackets, the figure stands motionless between two shops. Upon closer inspection it appears to be a he, and he’s moving his hands as though turning the pages of an invisible book. Freakin’ witches. 

“Hey,” Futakuchi calls out as he edges closer. “What’re you doing out this late? Go home.”

The witch doesn’t acknowledge him. He frowns.

“Yo, you hear me? You got a coven waiting for you?” God, he hopes so. Witches without covens are either vulnerable or unstable—usually both. “Look, just cut out whatever you’re doing and I can go my merry way. You just look a little…you know. Like you’re hallucinating. Are you? You good?”

Nothing. Futakuchi sighs, braces himself for some nasty curses, and takes a deep breath in. This must be what Kenma needed him for.

“I don’t mean any harm, I just wanna make sure you’re ok. I’m gonna touch your shoulder now, buddy,” he says just before doing so. The witch whips around lightning fast and grabs his wrist so hard he _feels_ the bruises form.

“No!” It—oh, hey, it’s Akaashi—hisses. His eyes are wide in panic and his whole body shakes. “No, no, I was almost done reading—“

“Reading what?” Futakuchi says, ignoring the pain in his wrist. Akaashi freezes. Whatever trance he was in, he’s snapped out of it now. He lets go of Futakuchi’s wrist and curls in on himself.

“…where am I?”

“Uh,” Futakuchi says. “Downtown?”

“I was in a library. How did I even…?”

“What? There’s no place like that around here,” Futakuchi says. He rubs out the pain in his wrist but doesn’t waste any magic healing it up. “I’d know. I’ve literally lived here since it was a mere trading post. There’s no magic libraries here.”

“You’ve…” Akaashi glances around carefully. “I’m…in town.”

Futakuchi takes a moment to think this through. Akaashi looks so achingly familiar. Futakuchi remembers what it was like to be in his shoes, remembers being helped.

“I know,” he says slowly, “that I’ve been stickin’ out of your guys’ business. But how about I help you get home.”

Akaashi frowns. “I…I think that might…be best.”

“Before we go I’m gonna grab us some stuff from my place, see if we can get your spiritual—“ he waves his hand around Akaashi’s general area—“whatever fixed up. Get your head cleared. I make a mean tea.”

Akaashi nods. Futakuchi’s pretty sure the poor guy would agree to just about anything at this point, the witch is that out of it.

“Okay,” he mutters to himself. “Okay.” He needs to be calm about this. If she’s back, him panicking will only help her win. Also, Futakuchi really doesn’t want to fuck up Akaashi’s energies, so. 

As they walk anger and fear seep into Futakuchi’s core. It pours into his bones and makes his smile brittle, and Akaashi is too dazed to notice the earth trembling beneath their feet.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Kunimi sleeps, he doesn’t dream. There are no memories resurfaced, no imagined battles or monsters. One moment he is conscious, and in the next he is not.

While this is not unusual to those who sleep very little, it is particular to him because he did, once, dream. Vividly, as though he were really experiencing such things, to the point that he could no longer tell reality from the dream. Days passed where he was uncertain what Ushijima had done to him; days where he could no longer see what he had become. 

He did some awful, awful things. To himself. To other blasphemies. There is a reason he survived so long, when the others dropped like flies. Most clung to their humanity like a blanket where Kunimi embraced the darkness.

But that was always the difference between them.

The memories were gone from his head. He has no inkling of who he was or what he did as a human, or how long he was under Ushijima’s control. He can’t even remember meeting Oikawa. He doesn’t remember hurting or being hurt, ripping out his heart for the first time. 

He doesn’t even know if he _should_. Would those memories be his own? Did he even have a life of his own before?

His body remembers. There are moments where he goes to defend himself in Oikawa’s daily sparring sessions and realises his body is moving of its own volition. Flashes of déjà vu as he walks through the forest.

But tonight…tonight he dreams.

It’s awful.

Are they memories? Or merely daydreams? Is he even asleep?

Through it all a hand works over his neck like a vice, heavy and dangerous like Ushijima’s but somehow smaller, frailer. Fragile. But no less dangerous.

When he wakes up he immediately leaves the bed, careful not to disturb Oikawa, Iwaizumi, and Kuroo. Bokuto is still downstairs waiting for Akaashi to come home, so Kunimi pads over to what used to be a study. There’s a bed in the corner and Tsukishima lays on it over the covers, staring at the ceiling.

“You can’t sleep either?” The blond asks. Kunimi shakes his head. “Bad dream?” Kunimi shrugs. “C’mere.” 

They lay on the bed together, not quite touching. The windows are open and the air is cold.

“If there’s anything going on with you, tell me,” Tsukishima says seriously. “Are you ok?”

Kunimi stares up at where Bokuto’s started shaving off the popcorn ceiling. The werewolf is hoping that this room can be entirely redone to be more welcoming for all their unexpected guests. 

He remembers something strange. Something new.

“There’s…a woman,” he says slowly. “Who exists near train tracks. And she has a chess board, but she’s the only one who sits at it. And one day Ushijima visited her.” He places his hands on his thighs and takes a deep breath. “And he felt like he was coming home. And I don’t dream. But tonight I dreamt of her.” 

It’s a little unpleasant to say. But it’s true.

“She made me feel…small.” He whispers. “Like…she could see through me. And when we went out to see Bokuto, I looked into the woods and felt the same way.” 

Tsukishima shifts around so that he’s on his side. “You think she’s real or something?” Kunimi shrugs. “Maybe the fact that you dreamed it is what’s bringing those emotions back.” 

Kunimi still says nothing.

“Well,” Tsukishima sighs, “either way, we can go around the woods tomorrow morning and check it out. We can even bring Iwaizumi just in case.”

Kunimi smiles a little. Settled now, he curls up against Tsukishima’s chest and closes his eyes. 

He’s ready to go back to sleep.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kuroo sighs when he wakes up to a Kunimi-less bed. Oikawa has his arms snaked around Kuroo’s body, clinging on like a limpet, and Kuroo struggles to wriggle out.

“Iwaizumi,” he hisses into the darkness after five minutes of struggling. “Iwaizumi, wake up.”

“For the love of god,” Iwaizumi grumbles into his pillow without opening his eyes. 

“ _Iwaizumi_. Get your ripped ass over here and help me get my boyfriend off of me before I pee in this bed!”

That gets the angel up. Iwaizumi blearily scowls at him and throws an arm over Oikawa’s waist, yanking him off like a bandaid. Oikawa lets out an unsatisfied noise and turns to burrow into Iwaizumi’s hold. 

“Thanks,” Kuroo whispers, relieved. Iwaizumi just grumbles back at him, shuffling deeper into the covers as Kuroo rolls out of bed and tiptoes into the bathroom. When he’s done he yawns and starts padding back to bed when he notices the downstairs lights still on.

Bokuto. Aww.

Kuroo makes his way downstairs as quietly as possible and finds the man strewn over the couch, totally zonked out. With a gentle smile the vampire gets a blanket over him and makes sure his head is properly elevated, before pressing a kiss to his forehead. Guess it’s up to Kuroo to take up vigil for their missing witch, now.

He plants himself by the window with a throw blanket and a new biography and settles in for the unforeseeable future. 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Akaashi really comes to, his throat feels raw. He’s sitting on some sort of…bar? His feet are resting on one of the old wooden bar stools, and the whole place has a really weird energy. When he hears rummaging around behind him he glances over his shoulder and raises an eyebrow, too exhausted to react properly.

“You’ve finally stopped evading us,” he says plainly. Futakuchi rolls his eyes and comes back over with a badly smoking candle and cup of tea. He starts waving the candle around Akaashi’s face.

“Well,” the—witch, perhaps?—drawls, “you didn’t really give me much of a choice. Nearly yanked my fuckin’ arm off.”

It’s true. Futakuchi has ugly hand-like bruises all up his left arm. 

“I…I did that?” Akaashi asks wearily. “Was I attacked by a coven?”

“Nah,” Futakuchi says. “That would be too easy.” He sets the candle down and starts waving his hand over the tea. “Shit’s always complicated with you four. I was trying to stay out of it. Here, drink this. It’ll help clear your head.”

Akaashi hesitantly takes a sip without taking his eyes off Futakuchi, and his nose scrunches up in distaste. 

“What kind of tea is this?!”

Futakuchi gives him the stink eye. “The magical kind, you ungrateful shit. So drink up.”

Akaashi rolls his eyes and takes a couple more sips. “So…seriously, what happened?”

“Well,” Futakuchi lets out a breath and leans against the bar. His eyes drift over the wineglasses hanging upside-down by the wooden fixture above them. “Funny story actually, you got caught in the crossfire of a hunting.”

“Wait—you’re saying a _hunter_ did this?”

“No,” Futakuchi answers slowly. “I’m saying that something strong was hunting someone, and you got caught in the middle. Just ask your boyfriend, the vampire, I’m sure Kenma’s told him about it.”

“Kenma?” Akaashi blinks. “You know Kenma?”

“Of course I know Kenma, that’s how I got involved with you shits in the first place.” Futakuchi’s got…quite the personality. “This, er, _hunter_ of sorts, she is really powerful. Like, way beyond the realm of what you or even I can achieve.”

Well, that’s quite a statement. “If she’s so powerful, why haven’t I heard of her?”

“Because,” Futakuchi says simply. “She doesn’t really intervene in our world much anymore. At least, until now.”

“And so she attacked me because…?”

“Right. Uh, drink the rest of your tea before I get into this. You’ll need it.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“TOORU!” Comes a terrifying shout from downstairs, followed by the front door slamming into the wall and knocking over the coat hanger on the way. 

Oikawa groans. Can they just have a couple years? A couple years of peace and quiet? He smushes his face into Iwaizumi’s bicep.

“Jesus Christ!” Kuroo yelps from somewhere in the living room, evidently having been woken up by the commotion. “Keiji, what the hell?!”

Footsteps hurrying up the stairs—two pairs, Oikawa thinks. He sighs. Looks like another long day.

“Tooru!” Akaashi exclaims, gasping for breath in the bedroom doorway. He flicks on the lights and Oikawa fights back a wail. 

“ _What_?” He seethes. Akaashi is visibly taken aback by the hostility before he breaks into a relieved grin. 

“You’re okay,” he says weakly. He flops onto the bed on top of Oikawa and rubs his nose into the soft, warm skin of Oikawa’s neck. “I was so worried.”

Oikawa clearly has no idea how to move, but his body is basically pinned down so he couldn’t even if he wanted to.

“I have,” he says, “no idea what is going on.”

“I _wish_ I had no idea what’s going on,” sighs a figure from the doorway. Oikawa cranes his neck and squints.

“Hey!” He realizes. “You’re the guy from before!”

Tsukishima materializes behind the guy, face deep-set in a scowl.

“Can you guys shut the fuck up? Kunimi just got back to sleep.”

“Ugh. This isn’t even my fault,” Oikawa groans. “Tsukki, make them leave _me_ alone so that _I_ can sleep.”

“Tsukishima?” Echoes the guy. He whips around. “Wait, _Legion_?!” 

Tsukishima blinks. “Aren’t you a baker or something? You make my coffees.” 

“Uh, yeah. Side gig to—” the guy gestures around— “this bullshit.”

Tsukishima nods like that’s some sort of reasonable answer. Oikawa wants to smack them both but he can’t because Akaashi is dangerously close to suffocating him. He flails in his boyfriend’s grip and ends up swatting Iwaizumi in the chin.

“Fuck off!” The angel explodes. They all stare. “You two! Get out of this bed. Some of us are TRYING to sleep. And you!” He waggles his finger at the guy, “You’d better have a good fucking explanation for this or I _swear to Jesus_. Now I am going to turn over and close my eyes and if this room isn’t dark and empty within ten seconds I will smite you all to the satan-spawn ratchet hole in the shitstain floor hellfire that you came from!”

“Wow,” says Oikawa. 

Iwaizumi turns over and suddenly everyone becomes the fastest supernaturals to ever vacate a bedroom, tripping over each other in their haste. By the time they’ve raced to the bottom of the stairs the baker is clutching at one of the rails, chest heaving and face all screwed up.

“What the hell,” he gasps. “Is this some sort of collect-them-all polygamy thing? How many people even live in this house?”

“Maybe you would know if you weren’t avoiding us all the time,” Oikawa grumbles. Akaashi rolls his eyes.

“Can’t we just—“

“Uh, guys?” Kuroo asks. He’s standing in the doorway to the living room, hair ruffled and sporting matching black joggers and t-shirt. “I, uh, made coffee.”

“It’s three in the morning,” Tsukishima says blankly. 

“Yeah. And I made coffee. So can we all just—“ Kuroo gestures them into the living room and they file around the coffee table. Bokuto is blinking awake on the couch and Akaashi sits next to him and ruffles his hair gently. Kuroo grabs a coffee and sits on the floor next to the baker, who gives him a weary look and edges away.

“To be clear, I still don’t wanna be up in your guys’ business,” the baker says. “But it’s looking like I might have to be because your business is about to fuck up the whole town.”

Oikawa glances around at all his boyfriends and wishes he could know what they’re thinking. Akaashi still hasn’t let go of his hand and it’s going a little numb.

“I…was in danger?” He asks tiredly.

The baker shrugs. “Probably. I mean, out of everyone here, I imagine you and Akaashi are the ones with the biggest range of power. No offense to the rest of you. And you’re the one that has all of Ushijima’s power now, so you’re probably—ah fuck, let me start over. Someone is hunting Kenma.”

“What.” Kuroo growls. The baker edges back a little more.

“He’s fine, he’s fine. I actually saw him a couple hours ago. Thought he’d tell you about all of this. But he’s gotta play his cards really well because I can’t even begin to convey how strong this bitch is.” He points at Oikawa. “You have—I think, like, an eighth of her current power right now.”

“Well, fuck,” says Oikawa. The baker waves him off.

“That’s actually not—never mind. Anyway, she’s obviously trying to take out his key players. Which are probably all of us, and then some.”

Kuroo realizes it just before Oikawa does. “Tooru’s a demon lord. She knows that.”

The baker nods. “As far as I know, yeah, she does. And technically, she’s after all of you and not just him. You’d know. If you were, you know, listening.”

“Woah, woah, back it up,” Bokuto says. “What?” He shuffles farther into Akaashi’s side and breathes through his nose.

“Look, it’s kind of hard to explain. Basically, Kenma’s been clashing with her since—er… They’re—well, they’re two of a kind. Equally matched. They knew that if it came down to it, they would destroy each other.”

“And this has to do with us because…?”

“Because,” the baker snaps. “She’s going batshit trying to figure out who’s better. Stronger. And she’s confident that it’s her. So Kenma’s gotta be careful about who he decides to keep close.”

Kuroo folds his arms tight over his chest and frowns. “You’re saying he is using all of us,” he says flatly.

“No. He’s not, he just—look, he just. He hasn’t had people in a while. But I think—I mean, I’ve only known him for so long. I think he’s lonely, ok? The guy just wants to be left alone. I think he wants to hang out with you guys for whatever fucking reason. But he can’t do that when he’s constantly caught up in her stupid head hunt.”

The baker waits to let them all process. Kuroo looks like he’s doing jigsaw in his head and Oikawa decides to cut through the painful process of watching Bokuto attempt to understand.

“So,” he says, “you’re not saying he wants to use us. You’re saying he’s lonely, and he trusts us enough to believe that we will win.”

“Is no one going to comment on the fact that they’re not just battling it out hand to hand immediately? Fuck, I hate melodrama,” Tsukishima groans, draping himself back against the couch. 

They all ignore him.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” the baker says, relieved. “I really think he chose you guys because you were already involved to begin with.”

“What does _that_ mean?” Akaashi asks, but Oikawa reaches out a hand to stop him because he sees that familiar glint in Kuroo’s eyes.

“Ushijima was her creation,” the vampire says slowly. “Ushijima was _hers_! Because the only thing that can’t truly be created—“

“—is a soul,” Oikawa whispers. “A heart.”

_Ushijima had no heart._

“If we’re looking at this like a game, he wouldn’t’ve been her king, right? Or the game would be over,” Kuroo continues, gaining traction as he goes. “He was her…Queen?”

_Well,_ Oikawa thinks, _isn’t that ironic?_

“So why is she getting involved now?” Kuroo asks. “Ushijima’s been gone for so long.”

The baker shrugs. “People that strong, who felt invincible for almost an eternity…they’ll do anything to protect what they want. Kenma’s a threat, and anyone who allies themselves with him is too. I guess she just finally got tired of waiting for another opportunity.”

“Well, that’s fucking great.”

Akaashi pauses from rubbing comforting circles over Bokuto’s shoulder. “You don’t seriously think he’d kill her, do you?” 

Kuroo shrugs. “To be honest? I would in his shoes. A life of running from someone like that is no life at all. He’s tired. And now she’s cornering him and the people he cares about.”

There are a lot of things that Kuroo says sometimes that makes Oikawa wonder what sort of life the hunter’s led before meeting them. Kuroo doesn’t talk a lot his past because he says it brings up bad memories and makes it harder for him to move on. And Oikawa respects that, really, he does. It’s just…can’t Kuroo trust them enough to just gloss over the bad parts? It feels like there’s a whole other side to Kuroo that none of them ever get to see.

But it’s wrong to pry. Oikawa knows he has trouble seeing the line between being curious and caring, and being way too into other’s business. He can’t push this.

“Well, anyhow,” the baker cuts in, “she’s going after Kenma’s inner circle to cut out any support he has. Like I said, when it’s just them, they’re equally matched. They’re both smart, the only difference now is that she’s panicking. She’ll act out. And she’ll be going after anyone she thinks will help him, and that includes you guys.”

“What kind of danger are we in exactly?” Tsukishima asks. The baker hesitates. There’s something very tired about the way he wrings out his hands.

“Just—be careful. She has a habit of getting in people’s heads. Keep an eye on each other. And I’ll be keeping an eye on you all, too.”

“God,” Kuroo sighs. “I’m so sick of mind control bullshit.”

The baker glances between Kuroo and the others curiously before honing in on Bokuto. “You,” he says, jerking his head to indicate who he’s talking to, “what do you think?”

“What?” Bokuto asks, surprised. 

“What do you think? You’re a werewolf, right? You probably notice things we don’t. Anything weird going on?”

Bokuto looks around them all uncertainly. “I mean…weird stuff always happens here? Kunimi and Tsukki keep getting stuck in the pantry. And…there’s a weird…I don’t know. It’s like there’s a bubble over the house, and when I’m at home I don’t really sense things as well. Like…a muffler?”

Well, that can’t be good. 

“I also—“ Kuroo begins, and cuts himself off. He blinks. “I, uh. I…” 

They all stare at him. 

“Bro, are you good?” Bokuto asks. Kuroo stares blankly at him.

“I…sorry. I. Sorry, I forget what I was going to say.”

“Well, just keep your shit together so I don’t have to look after you like actual children,” the baker says, standing up. “Please leave me the fuck alone unless you actually have something important to say. Or, oh—if any of you are interested in getting very, very drunk.”

“You can’t just leave us after dropping something like that!” Oikawa exclaims. He balls up his hands and takes a deep breath. “I have so many questions. Like, where is Kenma? Why didn’t he tell us this himself? How long have we been a part of this? Since before Ushijima? Has she been following Tetsu since him and Kenma first met? Does Kenma really plan on k—hey!”

The baker eyes him warily from where he’s extracting himself from the room. “Yeah, no. I’m not playing twenty questions. I helped because one of you was stuck in her bullshit hallucination, and now I’m done, and I gave you as much information as I have myself, thank you very much, and I have a date with my bar, so if I may, good-fucking-riddance.”

With that, he leaves. They all sit there in silence.

Oikawa gets up. “I need to go for a walk.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It’s been two days. Kuroo is starting to get headaches every time he looks towards the woods. He dropped most of his cases for the foreseeable future just so that he can keep himself together. Every time he opens his mouth to say—

Say what? 

He can’t remember.

He sits at his pile of rubbish, all his papers and files, and picks one up. It’s old—three years old, all finished and copied and sent to the original client. With great trepidation he takes it and walks over to the recycling bin, and tosses it in. It feels good. He grabs another one and throws that in as well. Soon he’s clearing away debris that’s gathered since he first moved in. He stops when he notices what he’s pretty sure is Oikawa’s notebook. Picks it up and opens it curiously.

_I never gave much thought as to how I would die._

Jeez, he thinks, and laughs quietly to himself. Now that he’s unearthed his desk he sets the journal on it, out so that Oikawa can easily find it.

When he looks out to the window, Kenma stands outside of the house. His hair is dark, undyed, and he’s directly outside of the window. Kuroo jumps back.

Kenma taps on the window as his silent request to be let inside, and it strikes Kuroo that it’s the first time Kenma’s ever really been on their property in a casual setting.

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, and goes to the back door to let him in. Kenma’s a lot shorter than him, but he has a presence about him that’s almost as big as the house. He follows when Kenma heads towards the bathroom, seemingly knowing where to go without being shown. When they get there he sits on the toilet and shows Kuroo a paper bag.

Hair dye. Ah.

“Yeah, yeah,” Kuroo says again with a chuckle. He helps Kenma lean back enough to get his head under the sink and pulls on the cheap pair of gloves. “Is this the human stuff, or did you get it from a witch?”

“A mage,” Kenma sniffs.

“Good lord.” 

“Yeah.”

They’re silent as Kuroo carefully wets Kenma’s hair and starts working in the product.

“You could’ve—“ Kuroo starts, stops just as fast. “You could’ve told me. I wouldn’t—if you were worried I’d tell my boyfriends, I wouldn’t’ve. You’re—fuck, you’re my best friend, Kenma. You saved me. I will always put you first.”

Kenma’s eyes slide open briefly and meet Kuroo’s before closing again.

“I know,” he says simply. “You shouldn’t.”

“But—“

“Stop,” Kenma continues blithely. “You aren’t who you were anymore.”

“That doesn’t mean I won’t be here for you!”

“You don’t owe me. We’re friends. Equals.”

Kuroo growls, eyes flashing a hint of red. “How am I supposed to stand on equal ground with you when you never tell me what’s going on?!”

They eye each other with frustration for about a minute.

“You’re so determined to put yourself last,” Kenma says finally, “and someday it will kill you.”

“So what, you think if you tell me everything I’ll just put myself in danger over it?”

Kenma gives him a look and the message is clear: _Don’t you?_

“It’s not that easy,” Kuroo says. He hesitates, then decides to change the subject. “She went after Akaashi. Made him hallucinate for hours. Apparently she was trying to _literally_ get in his head. If she has the power to do that…” He thinks for a moment. “Kenma, just…be honest. You kept all this from me. Why would you put me in that kind of danger if you’re so damn dedicated to giving me peace? Does she think Oikawa is your key player in all of this? That puts him at so much risk.”

There’s a beat where Kenma has the strangest expression. He almost sits up before remembering that he has a head full of magic bleach.

“I—“ he says. “I didn’t.”

“What?” Kuroo chokes.

“Oikawa’s never really been mine when it comes to her. You are.”

Kuroo steps back, mind whirling.

“Oikawa killed Ushijima,” he whispers. “And took _all his power_.” He whips around and starts pacing. “She’s not taking interest in him because she thinks he’s yours, she’s taking interest because he’s _hers_.”

“I’ve never—I don’t play her game. She just chooses people and decides what they mean to me.” Kenma settles back against the bathroom counter, probably winded from doing the most talking he’s done in years. “Is she hunting, or playing a game?”

“Probably both,” Kuroo sighs. He starts working his hands back into Kenma’s hair. “She’ll want to keep up the facade of a game as long as she thinks it’ll keep you playing and not attacking her.”

“Playing is attacking. The players are real. She’s weaker without him.”

“Please tell me she can’t totally control his will.”

“Ok.”

Silence. Then: “Well, fuck! How am I supposed to tell him that?!” Kuroo squeezes his eyes shut. He knows Oikawa is strong, he does, really, but how can they stop someone as powerful as her? How can _Kuroo_ when he’s just…him?

“I’ll protect him,” Kenma says seriously. “I’ll protect all of you. I won’t let her take anyone, not permanently.”

Kuroo resumes tending to his friend’s hair. They spend the rest of the afternoon in silence. 

After all, what is there to say?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Yeesh,” Oikawa says, twisting his fingers around the edges of his hoodie. Well, Bokuto’s hoodie, technically. “So this is his secret lair.”

“Mm.” Akaashi curls his arm around Oikawa’s waist as they approach the back of the bakery. This part looks more like a house, with a wide porch that has brittle wooden chairs and various glass bottles hanging from a rope strung over the ceiling. They pad up the steps and approach the stain glass door.

“Here,” Akaashi says. He flicks his hand and the door unlocks and swings open.

“Wow,” Oikawa breathes. He curls himself so his arms are slung around Akaashi in a side-hug. “Have I mentioned that you using magic is kind of hot?”

Akaashi grins, turning his head to peck his boyfriend on the lips. “Let’s see if he’s here.”

They poke around a little bit. There are circular wooden tables attached to the floor, and a nice wooden bar with bar stools, but that’s about it. Everything seems like it’s in the process of being deep cleaned after a long period of stasis, a collection of wooden furniture washed but unpolished.

“Oh!” Akaashi says, pointing to a little wooden box behind the bar. “I think that’s where he got the tea leaves from.”

“Well, let’s grab some and get out of here. I don’t like the feeling I get from this place. It’s so…stale.”

“Yeah,” Akaashi agrees as he goes about trying to open the box. “He didn’t really seem to like it much either. It’s nice, but it just…it feels old. Like there’s some bad history here.”

“Yeah, so how about you don’t fucking break in, then?” 

They both whip around. Futakuchi is giving them a very unimpressed look from the doorway between the bar and the rest of the building. 

“Er,” Akaashi says. “We came for the tea. To see if it would help Koutarou’s senses.”

“It won’t.” Futakuchi crosses his arms over his chest and leans against the doorway. “It’s made specifically for human-based blood. Which you would know, by the way, if you had asked like a _normal person_.”

That’s…fair.

“Sorry,” Akaashi says. “We didn’t see anyone around.”

“Yeah, because you entered from the back of the building.”

That is…also a very good point. Akaashi blinks.

“I think I might need some of that tea as well,” he says instead. Futakuchi rolls his eyes and sighs as he pitches away from the door and walks over, shooing them away. 

“I’ll boil it and put it in to go cups. A different blend for your boyfriend, too. No offense, but you can’t do the kind of stuff this tea requires.”

“Then teach me,” Akaashi says with a frown.

Futakuchi turns and squints as he scans over Akaashi’s person. His expression is totally unreadable and it makes both Akaashi and Oikawa somewhat nervous.

“No.” Futakuchi turns his back to them and prepares the tea. 

“Why not?” Oikawa asks, an edge to his voice. Akaashi reaches over and holds his hand. From behind the bar, Futakuchi doesn’t turn back to face them.

“Because he’s not me and he’s not what I am, and if he attempts to do this magic it will mess with him.”

Oikawa’s eyes narrow. “Mess with him how?”

“Look, I have been doing this kind of magic for over a decade, and—“

“What even are you that would set you apart? You don’t strike me as being a witch.”

Akaashi muses over that. Oikawa’s right, Futakuchi is not at all a standard magic-user. He’s frank, his movements jerky and direct where they could be graceful; he holds himself without the unnatural posture magic bestows upon its deliverers. Most witch magic is young, fitted for the user and full of vitality; for all that Futakuchi appears younger than them, there is an ache Akaashi gets in his bones from being nearby.

What makes this one different. How is he close with Kenma? Akaashi eyes his boyfriend and knows that the demon is making his own hypotheses in the silence.

“Stop getting up in my business,” Futakuchi says finally. He straightens up his posture and spins around with a to-go holder of four cups of tea.

“Oh, I don’t…” Oikawa shakes his head. “I’m not—“

“I know you’re not human,” Futakuchi interrupts. “They’re all labelled. Should help you all with the bullshit you’re dealing with. Come to the _front_ of the store and I’ll make it for you if you need it again. So stop coming through the back and snooping around my personal stuff.”

“We’re not good at leaving people alone,” Oikawa says. “We’ll definitely be back.”

“For the love of god, I hope someday this comes back to bite you in the ass. Look, I’m not the kind of person you want to be associated with. I’ll keep an eye on you all from a distance, and that can be that.”

Akaashi shrugs. “Maybe you’re not that kind of person, but you’re interesting and you have answers that we don’t. And you have magic that I think I can do if you decide to teach it to me. Please consider it. And thank you for the tea.”

Futakuchi looks like he wants to slug them, but he offers up a grimace of a smile.

“Trust me, you don’t want to do the kind of magic I’m good at. Now get out.”

They’re wearing him down, Akaashi thinks. It won’t happen right away, but eventually they’ll all be friends. 

They wore down Tsukishima, after all; Futakuchi doesn’t stand a chance.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Iwaizumi gets back, it’s to Bokuto and Kuroo wrestling Tsukishima into a playful battle over the stereo remote. Kunimi’s curled up in the nearby armchair, watching them with large dark eyes and a fond expression.

“Yo,” Iwaizumi says, ruffling Kunimi’s hair. The kid’s looking a lot better now, fully recovered from his brief time with Akiteru. Good.

“Hey.” Kunimi lifts his foot to avoid Bokuto launching at his boyfriend.

“Looks like you guys are having fun. You sleeping ok since everything?” Iwaizumi doesn’t really understand a lot about Futakuchi or his weird explanation for things, but it sounds intense. Kunimi nods. “Good, good. Mind if I join you then? I could use a breather.”

Kunimi shifts so that there’s enough room for Iwaizumi to squeeze in next to him on the chair. Iwaizumi does, one wing extended so that Kunimi can lean back on it and the other tucked in to avoid getting cramped. They watch Tsukishima succumb to the other two supernaturals, letting out an annoyed sigh and going limp.

God, does Iwaizumi love these idiots. To be honest, he can’t even believe that they haven’t known each other for decades. He was so lost those years without Oikawa, he can’t even remember how it felt when he spent his free time tirelessly tracking any demon sightings just to catch a glimpse of his friend. But there is a part of him that’s…well, terrified. 

Kuroo and Oikawa are his biggest concerns. Well, Oikawa will always be his concern. Iwaizumi doesn’t think a day will go by that he won’t panic if he doesn’t see the demon. But Kuroo…he hasn’t been the same since Akiteru. Since being mind controlled. And now something seems to be eating away at him, and it all makes Iwaizumi nervous.

He blinks back to the present and finds Kunimi eyeing him uncertainly. 

“I’m fine,” Iwaizumi assures him. “Just tired. And I need to have a chat with Kuroo.”

Kuroo looks up from where he’s trapped under Tsukishima’s limp body. 

“Me?” He asks innocently. “Gotta say, I’m a little tied up at the moment.”

Tsukishima rolls off of him and he sits up, ruffling his hair. 

“Well?” Iwaizumi raises an eyebrow. He doesn’t want to get up, not when Kunimi is warm against his side and the ice hasn’t been broken—Kuroo is a notoriously tough nut to crack—but this is important. For Oikawa.

Kuroo sighs and gets to his feet, grabbing a water bottle from the coffee table. “Let’s go, then. Sit out on the gazebo; it doesn’t look too chilly outside, I think.”

They stroll out, Kuroo with an easy gait and Iwaizumi far more tense. His wings flutter nervously behind himself.

“So,” Kuroo says as they settle on the cold wood of the gazebo. He drops his water bottle onto the surface and they both watch it roll off. “Jesus. Looks like Bo has some work cut out for him.”

“I thought he just re-leveled it?”

Kuroo shrugs. “Anyway, you wanted to talk. Let me guess—it’s about Akiteru.”

“I just want to reiterate that I’m here for you,” Iwaizumi says carefully. Kuroo and Oikawa are similar; come off too strong and they’ll only close up. “And that it seems lately like you’ve been trying to talk about something, and it hasn’t been working.”

Kuroo frowns and looks out towards the woods. “I just—I—“ He looks incredibly frustrated. “My work has been—“ Suddenly he cuts off, face blank. When he looks up his frustration is totally gone. “Sorry, what were we talking about?”

“That!” Iwaizumi exclaims. “You’re just shutting down, like—“

Like he doesn’t even realize it. Oh, oh shit. Oh, shit fuck, Iwaizumi hates magic.

“Uh…” Kuroo says uncertainly. “Sorry. I’ve just had trouble concentrating lately.”

He really looks apologetic about it. Most of the time when he has trouble at work he talks extensively about it, and then finds a solution. The fact that he’s not even able to talk about it means this spell is really fucking with him. Poor guy.

“You were talking about work. Has it been—“

“It’s been slow, yeah, and I think—“ Kuroo cuts off again, perplexed. “I think—“

They both sit there in silence for a few moments before Iwaizumi takes pity. 

“Yeah, buddy, you’re cursed.”

“What?” Kuroo asks, face open in shock. 

“Don’t,” Iwaizumi waves away the concern. “This is definitely not mind control—at least, not strictly. I’m betting it keeps you from even realizing something’s wrong. Look, try not to worry. I’m gonna take you into town to see that baker kid and we’ll get you sorted out. And then we can talk to the others and let them know, okay?”

“They don’t—they can’t know. They _can’t know_ , Iwaizumi!” Kuroo runs a hand through his hair and pushes off the gazebo base. “God, how are they supposed to trust me when I can’t even trust myself?!”

“They don’t blame you for what happened with Akiteru—“

“ _But they would for everything else!_ ”

Iwaizumi steels himself. This. This is the conversation he’s been trying to have since midwinter. 

“They wouldn’t,” he says with total certainty. “And if they did, I would beat them up. I would stand by your side. But they wouldn’t.”

“They would,” Kuroo paces, voice cracking. “They would and they would leave me—there’s a reason we don’t talk about our pasts!”

Iwaizumi freezes. “I’m sorry, _excuse me_?!”

“What?! You seriously think I would open that can of worms?!”

“Yes!” Iwaizumi screeches. “Because they’re your _boyfriends_. You guys seriously don’t—of all the dumb fucking things you all pull, this is the worst of them. You have a history of being mind controlled, Kuroo, and you can’t just brush that away and not tell them. That leaves the kind of mental scars that give people episodes and paranoia.”

He blinks and realizes now that they have an audience. Oikawa and Akaashi are staring at them from the driveway, close enough to hear the shouting but probably not enough to make out the words. Bokuto and Kunimi and Tsukishima are all staring from out the window.

“You know what? We’re going now. We’re going to break your curse and _talk about this_ , because dammit Kuroo, if it doesn’t happen with someone you’re going to fucking break down.”

“Fine,” Kuroo mumbles, scrubbing at his face and following Iwaizumi. Either way, the angel reaches out and puts Kuroo’s wrist in a vice grip. Oikawa wordlessly holds out the car keys for him when they get close enough, eyebrows raised.

“Have fun,” he says carefully, already pushing Akaashi towards the house. While both Kuroo and Akaashi have their backs turned, the two share a nod, and Iwaizumi is struck with a realization that Oikawa has probably known the entire time. Waiting. Watching.

“We will,” Iwaizumi tells him. They get into the car.

There’s a long day ahead of them.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Where are they going?” Bokuto asks, reaching out as Akaashi passes him a to-go cup of tea. “They both looked really mad.”

“Out,” Oikawa says breezily. He gets like that sometimes, when he knows something that they don’t. It’s a little frustrating, though most of the time Bokuto feels relieved. It means that whatever’s been bugging Oikawa—and, by extension, Kuroo—is being resolved.

“And the tea?” Tsukishima asks, raising an eyebrow.

Akaashi is the one to answer this time. “It’s from Futakuchi. The baker. He made tea to help me once, and I got him to make tea for all of us as well. It’ll help clear our minds when the—the _witch_. Hunter. Whatever she is, when she messes with us, this helps. I’ll make sure Tetsu gets his later.”

“It tastes nasty as fuck,” Bokuto says. It’s true. It sort of tastes like Akaashi’s dank chicken—salty and depressing. He downs the whole cup in one go and tosses the cup aside to snuggle up against Oikawa’s side. “Glad y’all found something that works, though.”

“Oh, we did.” Oikawa pauses. “Um, sorry, when did we decide it was socially acceptable to play American music in this household?”

“Blame your idiot boyfriend,” Tsukshima scowls. Bokuto rolls his eyes dramatically, and they stick their tongues out at each other until Oikawa slaps the back of Bokuto’s head.

“Sounds like I need a divorce,” he snickers, leaning over and pressing a handful of kisses to Bokuto’s cheek. Bokuto turns bright red and grins, whipping around and corralling the demon into his arms and snuggling their faces together. Tsukishima makes a gagging noise and flops onto the chair where Kunimi’s curled up. 

“Love you both,” Akaashi murmurs as he slips past them too, spreading himself out comfortably on the floor. Oikawa smiles over at him.

“You know…I have some leftover apple pie. We could always heat it up, lay back, have a nice night in…”

And for the first night all week, all was well.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Hey, I know you don’t like us but you also said to come here if we wanna get drunk off our asses,” Iwaizumi starts out with. Futakuchi gapes at them from where he’s wiping down a wooden counter.

“Uh,” he says slowly. And then he eyes Kuroo, understanding clear, and starts pulling out the shot glasses.

Thirty minutes and four shots later, and no one in the room can even stand up straight. Futakuchi’s brought out almost five different kinds of voodoo liquor and damn if it isn’t strong. It even tastes good, too.

Kuroo stares woozily into his glass.

“This, he says, “is either a very very bad decision, or a very very good decision.”

“Good,” Iwaizumi grunts. “Definitely good.”

“Let me get this straight,” Futakuchi slurs. His cheeks are flushed and he keeps fanning himself with a pamphlet from the bakery front. “You,” he points at Kuroo, “were part of a cult hunter group that literally mind-controlled you to try and give up you and your friend’s escape plan.” He swallows. “Then you became a, what, like, a _moral_ hunter or whatever and get mind controlled, _again_. And none of your idiot boyfriends know this. Because you think they won’t trust you. Because of your weird history of mind control.”

Kuroo presses his face to the counter. “That pretty much sums it up.”

“Bullshit.”

“What?!” Kuroo squawks, the same time Iwaizumi exclaims, “That’s what I said!”

“Bullshit!” Futakuchi waggles his finger at them, hand still clutching a bottle. “Bull. Shit. You’re just scared of yourself! Let me guess, you’ve had a slump at work and now you think you can’t do anything right. You’re giving your life a loophole.”

“It’s not a loophole,” Kuroo grumbles. Futakuchi raises an eyebrow at him expectantly. “It’s not—look. I just, every time I go to even see my office I just lose track of time. And I can’t think clearly. So I’m not getting anything done, and I keep coming to on the edge of our property with _no_ idea how I got there! And then whenever I try to tell someone about it, I fucking _can’t_!”

“Aha!” Futakuchi cries, making both his companions flinch. He grabs a bottle in the other hand and starts parading them around as he hollers. “Haha! Loophole! Fuck you, you bitchy old hunter! I’m the king of bullshit you fucker!”

“Bro, you’re super drunk.” Kuroo asks, eyeing the booze wearily. Futakuchi whips around and points again. He really needs to cut that out.

“The old hag cursed you! Well, think fucking not! Because you know what fucks you up worse than a curse?” He slams the bottles back onto the counter with pride. “Voodoo whiskey. Ha! Now—now we just have to keep you this way long enough to get you to a curse-breaker, and she’ll lose her hold on you.”

“What the fuck,” Kuroo whispers softly to himself.

“I think Kenma breaks curses,” Iwaizumi says helpfully. He goes to get up and falls to the ground, wings fully extended. He lolls around there for a minute, waving his limbs about, and then giggles up at Kuroo. “Or Akaashi.”

“Great!” Futakuchi cries. “I fucking hate this! Let’s go!”

“Woah, did you not just hear anything I had to say?!” Kuroo hisses. “I can’t see them! I can’t—they can’t know! They can’t!”

“Kuroo,” Futakuchi says. He lets go of the bottles after taking another swig, and puts his hands on Kuroo’s shoulders. It is very obviously taking a lot of effort to string together something coherent. “Kuroo. Buddy. I’m practically an old man trapped in a twenty-three year old body. I have experienced a lot of—things. Things you can never, ever speak of. Trust me. They won’t care. _You_ care, and Kenma cares about you for some fucking reason, so I care sort of by extension. So fuck whatever fears you have, I am not going to sit here and let you fuck this up.”

Kuroo blinks. “I…I—“ he swallows—“I need to be drunker for this.”

“You _don’t understand_!” The baker cries out, grabbing Kuroo’s shoulders even tighter. His eyes are wide with desperation. “You have people who love you! You have what literally everyone on this planet wishes they could have! So—god, just hold onto it! Let yourself love them fully because you don’t know when you’ll lose them!”

Kuroo takes a step back, still drunk but mind reeling with cold sobriety. 

“I…” He breathes, “I…I’ll try. I’m…sorry?”

Futakuchi doesn’t say anything else right away. He shoulders past Kuroo and goes to start hefting Iwaizumi to his feet.

“Well,” Kuroo mutters, “this will be fun.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

This is a very, very bad idea and all three of them realize it right about when Futakuchi knocks on the front door of the house. 

If they weren’t blitzed before they certainly are now. They’re each about ten shots in—Futakuchi’s been sneaking in sips of something terrifyingly orange in between—by they time they arrive. The truck is back at Futakuchi’s, sad and forgotten in an effort not to die on the way home.

“We should have kept one of us sober,” Futakuchi says right when the door opens. Tsukishima stares.

“Oh my god,” he says. 

Kuroo takes one look at him and then leans over into the side bush to throw up.

“Oh my god,” Tsukishima says again. “Oh my god, you’re _drunk_.”

“Shh,” Iwaizumi giggles, but it comes out a little gravelly and scary. Tsukishima takes a visible step back.

“I’m inclined to not let you guys in, but there’s a murder woman on the loose,” he says. “So know that otherwise, I would actually lock you guys out here.”

“I knew you love us,” Iwaizumi grins at him, smacking an affectionate kiss on the blond’s cheek. Futakuchi drags Kuroo to his feet and they stumble in together, leaning on each other the whole way. “Where’s the—the—the others? We’re drunk.”

“I know,” Tsukishima says. “That is shockingly obvious.”

“No, no—we have to be drunk.”

Tsukishima stares at him before shaking his head. “You know what? I don’t want to know. They’re asleep upstairs. I’ll get them; you all—just get to the living room.”

He sprints up the stairs as Iwaizumi corrals the other two into the living room and onto the couch. 

“Water,” he announces, and grabs three mugs to fill up at the sink. He walks them over to the others and hands them out. “Drink.”

Kuroo spits his out almost immediately, shocked. “Bro,” he wails, “what the fuck?!”

“What?!” Iwaizumi yelps, setting down his cup and hurrying over to try and figure out what’s wrong. Kuroo’s licking the pillow and Futakuchi stares into his cup with tired, old eyes.

“Oh my god,” Futakuchi says finally, “Iwaizumi, you gave a vampire fucking holy water.”

“What?” Iwaizumi asks.

“ _What_?!” Oikawa hisses. He hurries over and starts cooing over his boyfriend, kissing the vampire on the cheek and wrinkling his nose at the smell. “Did you…did you throw up? Wait, are you drunk?!”

“I just want to sleep,” Kuroo cries. “Why is being drunk so weird? I don’t remember it being like this.”

Futakuchi pulls out a bottle of something blue and waves it in Oikawa’s face. “Voodoo whiskey. Want some?”

Oikawa slaps the bottle away and it rolls somewhere under the couch. “Stop that! Why were you guys drinking?!”

Just as Iwaizumi opens his mouth to answer, the room fills up. Thankfully it seems Tsukishima is keeping Kunimi company upstairs. Wow, this was a bad idea.

“It’s all my fault,” Kuroo moans. “I can’t—I’m never me. I’m never me. I just want to press pause on myself.”

“What?” Akaashi asks carefully, situating himself next to Bokuto on the loveseat. “What do you mean?”

“I mean…that I keep getting my mind all,” he waves his hands around, “and it keeps affecting you all and I just want it to stop!”

“Tetsu,” Oikawa says in a warning voice, but it’s too late. Kuroo’s been held back for far too long, and now he can finally let go.

“I mean I used to be in this reaaaaally bad group, like so bad, and they never let me go outside unless it was to hunt and I couldn’t get _out_ and they made us k-kill any non-human we ran into, even if they helped us get the bad guy, but I couldn’t and I wasn’t strong enough so they _controlled me_ and then I almost betrayed my friends and then A-Akiteru did it _again_ twice and I was still helpless and even now I was under a curse and I didn’t even know it—“

“Woah,” Bokuto is there suddenly, his eyes meeting Kuroo’s and his expression open and concerned. “Tetsu, breathe. Just breathe with me. Everything’s gonna be ok.”

Kuroo nods through his tears, managing to get a somewhat steady breathing pattern going. 

“Sorry,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sorry, sorry—“

“It’s okay,” Bokuto says, leaning forward awkwardly to hug his boyfriend close. “We’re not gonna let anything bad happen to you. Okay? Those people can’t get you know, and Akiteru is gone, and we’re here. Even if something does happen, we’ll help you through it. That’s what we’re here for, and you’d do the same for us in a heartbeat. We know that.”

“Y-you do?”

“Sure! Oikawa knew immediately when something was wrong and came to me, actually, wanting to check in. We were giving you space to figure things out in case you wanted to come to us on your own. But don’t think for a second that we weren’t there, looking out for you. Because we were.”

Kuroo bursts into tears and pulls Bokuto into his lap, the werewolf chuckling fondly and nuzzling into Kuroo’s rat nest hair. 

“As cute as this is,” Futakuchi hiccups, “the curse isn’t gone.”

“What kind of curse?” Akaashi asks sharply.

“Can’t talk, can’t think properly. She was taking out Kenma’s star player before he could even put the guy on the game board.”

Akaashi looks between Futakuchi and Kuroo, piecing together the meaning, before his eyes widen. “Oh, god. Kuroo, as soon as you’re sober I’ll sort it out. I’m so sorry I didn’t notice. Fuck, I—“

“She’s fucking with you all in the head,” Futakuchi says easily, leaning back against the cushions. “Don’t beat yourself up over it; took me years to learn to deal with it.”

“/ with this kind of thing alone for _years_?” Oikawa asks, dismayed. Futakuchi eyes him wearily.

“I—I prefer being alone,” he says weakly. They can unpack that bullshit another day. “Just drink the tea I gave you and you’ll be able to detect it. Or get wasted, ’s just that the tea’s easier. More…convenient.”

“Of course,” Akaashi smacks his forehead. “Curses give way under the influence of something stronger. Very few curses can overpower inebriation.”

“I love you,” Kuroo tells him fondly, but it’s muffled by Bokuto’s sweatshirt.

“Um, not to break up all this bonding and stuff,” Oikawa says, “but what the fuck did you guys drink? I’m pretty sure Iwaizumi’s never been drunk in his life.”

Futakuchi just makes finger guns at him and winks.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Shh,” Oikawa whispers in Kuroo’s ear as the vampire comes to. “Keiji’s spell is still wearing off and you’re hungover as fuck, it’s gonna leave you with a bit of a headache.”

Kuroo mumbles something incoherent. He’s wrapped up in Oikawa’s comforter on the demon’s bed, and the rest of the room is empty.

“Where’re the others?” He croaks. Oikawa helps him sit up and plugs him with some water and salt crackers. 

“Iwaizumi and Futakuchi are both still passed out on the couch, I think. Keiji and Kou are out getting groceries with Kunimi.”

Kuroo’s voice comes out a throaty whisper as he asks, “are you mad?”

“You know…I want to be? But I’m not.”

“But—“

“Tetsu. We all have hard pasts. We don’t have to talk about that all at once. Pieces are fine. Nothing is fine. What matters is who you _are_. If you tell us everything, are you going to feel like you’re taking steps back? Then I don’t want you telling us. But if your past is keeping you from really trusting yourself—trusting us—then tell us. On your own time.”

Kuroo nods weakly. “I’ve been a coward, huh?”

Oikawa smiles. “Just a little bit. But we don’t love you any less for it.”

“Love you.”

“Love you too.”

They gaze at each other for a few moments before Oikawa starts back up again.

“She doesn’t see me as part of Kenma’s group.” he says slowly, “She thinks I’m hers. I _am_ hers. Aren’t I.”

Kuroo nods, tears pricking at the corner of his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too.” Oikawa wipes away his own tears. “I had a feeling. It didn’t sit right. And Kunimi said that Ushijima took him to her a long time ago. I think he’s hers also. Her…creation.”

“It would make sense,” Kuroo agrees reluctantly. His head feels clearer than it has in months. “She…she—“

“She wants to use the power I got from Ushijima,” Oikawa finishes for him. His expression is unchanged as he takes Kuroo’s hand and squeezes it. “It’s ok. It’s ok, Tetsu. You don’t have to hold it all in for us.”

“I’m sorry,” Kuroo whispers, voice cracking. “God, Oikawa, I’m so fucking sorry.”

Oikawa leans in and they hug each other tight.

“Love you,” Oikawa whispers. 

“I won’t let anything happen to you,” Kuroo cries. “I swear Tooru, I will always, always protect you.” Oikawa rubs his back.

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” he says through a watery smile. 

They curl up together in bed, whispering promises and sweet somethings. And in that moment, despite everything surrounding them in danger, all is well.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

There are some days that Akaashi likes more than others. Days where he takes the day off from studying, from learning and stressing, and just sits by the window with his tea. The gazebo seems like the perfect place to sit and think.

Kuroo has been a lot better the past few days. He’s always been good about taking time to reflect and focus on helping others. He and Oikawa apparently had a talk, though Kuroo said he’s been asked to stay mum until Oikawa’s ready to tell them all. More secrets, it seems. But maybe…maybe that’s just how life works. You never get the full picture.

Bokuto has matured so much since they met him. Every time Akaashi sees him it’s like someone put a heater in his chest. God, Akaashi is just so in love with them all. Getting to know and trust them took so much time, so much reaching for him. But falling in love? The easiest thing he’s ever done.

Not to mention Oikawa. The demon has gone through so much the past few years. He’s so strong, always looking forward. Always thinking about how to work towards a solution, willing to put in the work to find it. 

And Akaashi? He can barely believe how far he’s come. He could barely even think about demons, and now? Now he _lives_ with three of them. And he loves them all. How much time has he spent pushing away the very things that could heal him? Does he still do that?

“You look pretty lost in thought,” Iwaizumi says. He settles next to Akaashi on the gazebo platform and glances around. “Oh! Bokuto got it leveled out.”

Akaashi nods with a growing smile. “Took him a couple tries first, but yeah. He did.”

“Huh,” Iwaizumi grunts.

“I’m just thinking. It’s weird, sometimes, to think about who I used to be.” He tries to figure out how to word it. “How do you stop being ashamed of your past?”

Iwaizumi laughs. “Isn’t that a loaded question? Quick answer—you don’t. Of course you’re going to think you were an idiot in the past. That means you’ve _grown_. It’s a good thing. So, hopefully, you’re going to look back on yourself in a decade and think you were pretty stupid now, too.”

“So we’re all just stupid all the time,” Akaashi says flatly. Iwaizumi rolls his eyes and pokes his finger into Akaashi’s chest.

“What I’m saying, is that what matters is if you’re doing your best. That’s all you can do.”

Akaashi sits on that for a couple minutes as they sip on their respective mugs of tea. 

“You know,” he says finally, “we’re really lucky to have you around.”

“I know,” Iwaizumi shrugs. He breaks into a grin and Akaashi punches his shoulder.

“Yeah, yeah,” he laughs. 

But Iwaizumi is right, he thinks. He’s doing his best. That’s enough.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Futakuchi is cleaning up the remaining bottles of alcohol and setting them up behind the counter when it happens. The wind bustles in and sends several of the bottles shattering into the wall, slicing glass into Futakuchi’s skin. He hisses and holds out a hand to keep the wind at bay.

“Fuck,” he gasps when an errant branch whips through the door and hits him in the ribcage. He stumbles back and puts his hand out on the counter to keep from falling.

He’s not strong enough. He’s not—

He is. 

He has to be.

Futakuchi grits his teeth and stands, feels ice-cold hands pushing at his back like shadows, and opens his eyes to the figure in the doorway. She ebbs and flows like the tide, a strange conglomerate of colors that seem to shift constantly. Like she’s having trouble existing in their plane. 

Good. Let her suffer.

“You,” he growls, “are not welcome here.” A ghostly hand presses against his own and he bites back a whine.

“Little rook,” she croons. Suddenly she’s a breath away, her hand petting his cheek, and he freezes. Fear takes over his entire body and he becomes paralyzed. Hands tug at his wrists and urge him away. Even his breath falls short. She smirks.

“Little rook,” she says again. “Oh, I wish you were mine. We could have been wonderful together. You conjure such pretty things.”

He still can’t _say_ anything. Fuck. Fuck. Being hungover made him far too susceptible to this. He should have known better.

“Tell me where my Lord is, little rook.”

He says nothing. 

“Rook,” she says dangerously. Still, he remains silent. Her fingers curl into the soft part of his stomach and he lets out a pained gasp. “ _Rook_.”

“Go to hell,” he bites out. There is an unimaginable pain, hands tearing at every part of his body, and just as his vision goes he makes out the familiar glow of Kenma’s magic.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“What the hell happened here?” Oikawa whispers.

The bar is in ruins. The chairs are broken and strewn around. Bottles are smashed across the floor, and a hexed broom sweeps the glass shards off to the side of the room. Futakuchi is laid out on the counter, his back to a support beam to prop himself up. He’s covered in bandages and plasters. Kenma’s by his side, eyes glowing a violent red.

“She was here,” Futakuchi croaks tiredly. His pupils are blown to hell. “She—she wanted you. For reasons I’m sure you’re well aware of. Don’t worry, I didn’t give up your little hideout.”

“I thought she knew where the house was?” Oikawa asks, confused. He hooks his arm around Kunimi’s shoulders and keeps the littler demon close. Futakuchi shakes his head.

“She can see it, she can visit it by seeing it through one of our minds. But she can’t pinpoint the physical location and go there in person. That house is made of some tough stuff. We replicated some of it so she can’t find her way back here, now. Thank him for me, will ya?”

Sue him, but Oikawa’s actually worried about the prickly baker.

“Do you need anything?” He frets, drawing closer. Futakuchi reaches out an arm and grabs a glass of water, chugging it. When he finishes he says, “nah. What did you come here for? More tea?”

Oikawa shakes his head. “Just…a feeling. That something bad happened here.”

Futakuchi gives him a long, leveling stare. 

“You can sense her,” he says finally. “That’s not a good sign. She’s trying to weasel her way into your head slowly so you don’t realize it. Just…drink your tea and stay close to the others, okay?”

Oikawa nods. He can do that at the very least.

…Right?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

He’s dreaming of a far…far away place. Kunimi stands on the precipice of something old when he comes to, and she curls around his back.

“Hello, little one,” she coos. “My little rook.”

Kunimi says nothing.

“I’ve kept you dormant for so long, but it’s time for you to be mine again.”

His eyes trail down to the ground. There’s a stone with a strange symbol by his feet.

“I want,” she whispers, and trails off. “I want you to listen carefully. You cannot allow your demon master to lose his powers. Do you understand? If he dies, he will lose his memories of you. Of all of you. He will _leave you_. He will drift into nothingness with no one to help him and you will be alone.” Her words carry the weight of her ancient magic, and they seep into his bones like ice. “Stop him at any cost.”

“Any cost,” he whispers back, and she nods.

“Whatever it takes. I need you to do something to save him. It will save him forever, do you understand? Carve that rune into his body.”

Kunimi stares down at his feet at the stone and its rune, and nods.

He blinks, and he is back at the edge of the house property. He holds out his hand for a moment and feels resistance, and frowns. He pushes harder. Finally he steps inside, tries to remember what just happened. Can’t.

With a quiet noise he edges towards the kitchen. Something feels so very wrong. His entire body aches, like it wants something. He’s overwhelmed with the desire to find Oikawa.

He steps towards the pantry even as his body screams at him to turn away. Takes another step. Pain laces his ribs as he steps into the pantry and the magic kicks in, keeping him from leaving it. 

Better to stay here than to let something unknown control him any longer. 

He closes his eyes as the pain overcomes him.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Hello?” Oikawa calls into an empty house. “Guys?”

“Is it always empty like this?” Futakuchi asks, limping in after him. “I thought there were like ten of you in here.”

Oikawa peers around the corner into the living room and hears a faint scraping noise. They make their way through the room and into the kitchen to open the pantry door, where Oikawa gasps.

“Kunimi—“

“No!” Futakuchi snarls, dragging Oikawa backwards. They fall over from the struggle, and Futakuchi grabs Oikawa by the hood and yanks him away from the doorframe. Kunimi’s back is turned to them and he’s squatting and scraping something into the floor. 

“Something’s wrong,” Futakuchi hisses when Oikawa just sits there, staring in shock. “She must’ve gotten to him. Fuck, fuck!.”

“Kunimi!” Oikawa exclaims. “Kunimi, can you hear me?”

Kunimi’s head snaps over in their direction and they flinch back in surprise.

“Oikawa,” he whispers. His eyes are wide, slightly deranged as they flicker between red and ebony, his pale skin gaunt in the poor lighting. Any trace of his illusion is gone; his nails are sharp and his skin waxy and taut; scars curl around his wrists and ankles where Ushijima once shackled him. “Oikawa, you’re—you’re not allowed to leave me. I won’t let you. _I won’t let you._ ”

“Woah, I never said I would!” Oikawa says. “Kunimi—“

“You will!” Kunimi screeches, inhuman, and slams himself against the barrier of the pantry doorframe. They watch him crumple to the ground from the force of it, and for a terrifying moment Futakuchi thinks the smaller demon knocked himself out.

“Oikawa,” he mutters, “we need to get you out of here. If he gets out somehow he’s going to go for you.”

“Kunimi wouldn’t hurt me,” Oikawa says confidently. His expression, though, is anything but. Futakuchi grimaces.

“He won’t have a choice. You need to get out of here. Look, I know it seems like he’s hurting, but trust me when I say I have been in the position he’s been in and you need to get the fuck out of here so I can help him break whatever she’s got into his head. It’s nasty and I’ll barely be able to break it as is; you being here will only make it worse.”

Oikawa gazes back at Kunimi’s still form on the ground and swallows.

“F-fine. I’m going upstairs. Grab me as soon I can come down.”

“Oikawa.” Futakuchi makes eye contact. “This isn’t your fault. I just need to be able to take care of this on my own.”

Oikawa nods to him and takes a deep breath as he leaves. Futakuchi edges closer to the pantry. There are runes carved all over the floor in…Jesus, is that blood? He takes a closer look and finds one of Kunimi’s index fingers missing a nail, the blood leaking into a little pool on the ground. Yuck.

“Well,” he sighs. Better get started.

After all, they need the little demon on their side if their plan is going to work.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“I’m here,” Kuroo says into his phone. The wind is harsh and there’s a storm brewing; he has to bundle up in one of Bokuto’s ridiculous sherpa-corduroy trucker jackets to shield himself from it. Even for mid-afternoon it’s dark.

He feels a little bit bad for doing this behind his boyfriends backs, but honestly? It has to be done. He has to do this; if not for them, for himself.

“Hey.” Kuroo whips around and finds Kenma standing behind. “Ready?”

Kuroo swallows and nods. He tosses his phone to the side, stripping off Bo’s jacket and his shirts until he’s completely topless. Kenma pulls out a dagger the size of a letter-opener, the beautiful silver carvings shining in the dim light. When he steps forward he doesn’t take his eyes away from Kuroo’s.

“This will hurt,” the being warns. “A lot.”

“I know.”

“Okay then.”

Kuroo drops to his knees and lowers his head, reaching out to grip onto a nearby log for support as he braces himself. Kenma stands just behind him, a cold hand going to hold the back of Kuroo’s neck like a vice while the other handles the blade.

“There’s no undoing this, Kuroo,” Kenma warns. “If you do this, there’s no way back. Mind-altering magic will be powerless against you. But you can never be in a coven. Your body might respond badly to other types of magic. I honestly don’t know how it could affect you.”

Kuroo swallows.

“I know,” he whispers. He does. He wishes he could be stronger, for Akaashi, for Bokuto. But he can’t live his life constantly terrified someone will control him again. He’ll go insane. He’s _going_ insane. He needs this. He takes a breath—

“Do it.”

Screams fill the air as Kenma begins with the first carving.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Bokuto and Akaashi get home, Tsukishima having gone to meet up with some of his old flock, there is blood everywhere.

Literally, everywhere. They have to side-step a place where it’s dripping off the ceiling, black and grotesque. 

“Fuck,” Bokuto says. “Do we know anything that bleeds this much? What the fuck?”

They both freeze when they see two figures in the living room.

“Again,” Bokuto says, “what the _fuck_?”

Futakuchi and Kunimi are both _drenched_. Futakuchi’s chest is heaving as he lays spread-eagle on the coffee table, a knife in one hand and his eyes staring up at the ceiling. Kunimi sits on the couch, staring at Futakuchi.

“Sorry,” he says quietly. “We made a mess.”

“We? _We_ made a mess?” Futakuchi scoffs. “Speak for yourself. All this blood is yours.”

“Can I come down yet?!” Oikawa calls from upstairs, and both Bokuto and Akaashi turn their heads between the stairs and the pair in the living room.

“Uh,” Bokuto says. “Care to explain why our living room looks like the Carrie set?”

Futakuchi gets to his feet with what looks like the remaining energy he has. He drops the knife on the counter, looks over his shoulder at Kunimi as though he wants to say something, and then doesn’t. He saunters past the boyfriends without a word, pausing only to clap Bokuto on the shoulder, and then goes to the bathroom.

Silence sits heavy between the remaining trio as the sound of the shower starts.

“She was controlling me,” Kunimi says. “He made it so she wasn’t anymore.”

Akaashi opens his mouth to say something and shuts it in horror as some blood drips from the ceiling onto his hair.

“This is really disgusting,” he grimaces. He’d go to the kitchen and grab a towel but it looks like those are all goners, too. “Are you ok?”

Kunimi nods.

“Well, okay then. Kou, how about you go to Oikawa’s room and keep him company while Kunimi showers. I’ll figure out a way to—to deal with this. Lord, this is as bad as when Hinata and Kageyama molted at the same time.”

Bokuto laugh and pecks his boyfriend on the cheek before heading upstairs. Kunimi scurries past Akaashi with embarrassment clear on his face, and Akaashi is shocked when, instead of heading to the upstairs master bath, the little demon goes to join Futakuchi in the downstairs one. Seems the pair has bonded, not that Akaashi can be surprised.

With a little huff of amusement he spreads out his hands and starts working out some cleaning magic. Better now than later, after all.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kuroo comes home feeling totally exhausted. His back is raw enough that he could barely stand putting on the soft sherpa lining of Bo’s jacket, so he’s forgone his tighter, rougher undershirts. His shoulders ache and his voice his probably raw from all the screaming, but there’s a part of him that finally feels _free_. And god is it worth any consequences.

It’s late now and the moon has crept up slightly and sits low on the skyline, a haunting and pale yellow. 

“Welcome home, Kuroo,” he mutters to himself as he heads in. He kicks off his shoes into the bin when he notices something off and squints.

“The fuck…?”

Why is there blood on their doormat? From the smell of it, it’s definitely demon blood. Kuroo makes a strangled, confused noise in the back of his throat and decides that he’s just going to leave it be. Maybe demons get demon periods or something. Or Oikawa threw a fit and ripped out his heart again for a dramatic exit.

He locks the door, gingerly takes off his jacket to hang up, and heads up the stairs, smiling fondly at what he finds. 

Iwaizumi is in the middle, one arm hooked around Oikawa and the other pillowing Kunimi’s head. Tsukishima is curled around the smaller demon, and he cracks open an eye blearily to look at the unwelcome light. Hinata and Kageyama have their wings out and folded up, nearly encompassing the two demons. Akaashi is spooning Oikawa from behind, with Bokuto splayed over all of their legs. 

God, Kuroo loves them.

He toes off his socks and hopes to god none of them wake up as he shimmies out of his jeans and pulls on a pair of sweats. He rummages through the closet until he comes upon one of Oikawa’s ultra-soft sweaters and pulls it on to cover the scars. 

“Hey,” Akaashi mutters sleepily as Kuroo wraps around him. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Kuroo whispers.

For the first in a long time, he finally feels at peace.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“How do souls even end up in your graveyard?” Hinata asks, picking his way around a strawberry tart with a little fork. Tsukishima shrugs, leaning back in his chair. They’re sitting inside the cafe this time, avoiding the torrent of rain coming down in visible sheets.

“Fuck if I know.”

“Do you think the old demon lord is in there? Even though he was never human?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think—“

“Hinata.” Tsukishima growls. The angel flushes and eats his tart. 

“Just wondering,” he mumbles. “You know, angels know a lot about souls and stuff. We could figure out some spell to put on your flockmate to make sure he’s okay. I mean, if he has a soul. I’m still a little fuzzy on that whole deal.”

Tsukishima folds his arms over his chest. “What kind of spell?”

“I dunno. Kageyama’s really good at that stuff, he sets up the spell and uses me as a channel for more energy when he needs it. We could, like, make it so he’s extra lucky. Or so that if he ever does get controlled by her, there’s some sort of failsafe in his brain. Something like that.”

Tsukishima contemplates this. He’s gotten so used to staying away from angels that he forgot he can rely on them. Iwaizumi, a master of offensive power and supernatural location tracking, wouldn’t have any background in what they’d need. No, Tsukishima’s old flock was a route he should have gone towards earlier.

Well, nothing he can do about it now.

“If we did something like that and Oikawa unknowingly had other spells on him, would it fuck him up?”

Hinata’s eyes widen. “No! Oh my gosh, Tsukki, I’d never suggest it unless I knew it wouldn’t hurt him! I mean, it might do different things—mixing random spells is really bad—but it would never hurt him. Body or soul—whatever. We could even do it on the others just in case.”

Tsukishima deliberates again. How should he play this? Would Oikawa refuse? Was Oikawa even in the right frame of mind to choose for himself? He’s a self-sacrificial bastard.

Tsukishima remembers, then, what everyone else misses. He remembers the look of total, utter horror on Kunimi’s face way back when Ushijima was still around, back when Kunimi thought Oikawa was in danger. He remembers the way Kunimi trembled, terrified he would lose the one person in his life who has always put him first. Who rescued him from eternal servitude to a soulless murderer.

“Show me the spell,” Tsukishima says, “and don’t tell anyone else that we’re doing this.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Fuck,” Oikawa grumbles. He’s still trying to write his stupid introduction. The biography is sort of a brainchild between him and Akaashi, a way for him to reconnect his mind with his memories. His life before Ushijima, and his life after. 

It’s not going very well.

_~~The first thing I remember is~~ _

_~~It was a silent night when I first~~ _

_~~Living under Ushijima was~~ _

_~~I fucking hate writing books~~ _

_~~I remember going to sleep one n~~ _

He throws his journal across the room and it hits his wall with a sad little clap.

He sighs. 

Birds chip from outside his window and he blinks in awe as they peck at the windowsill. It amazes him how the lively springtime can just slip in between all of the darkness of winter. There’s still ice on the ground every morning, but the birds…they’re a nice change. It feels like the sign of a beginning.

Maybe he should get out more.

There’s been something calling Oikawa to the forest lately, like he needs to go. Most of his life as a demon was spent on the run in the forest, and to be honest he misses the trees. Autumn is most beautiful, but spring—well, there’s something special about that, too.

A backpacking trip. Something to jog his memories, give him the space to breathe.

With tremendous effort he stoops to gather up his journal, and flips it open to a new page. It doesn’t come out well, not by a long shot, but it’s better than nothing. How did he feel, back before all of this? During a time when his memories are still so hazy? What were his first thoughts as he came to in an entirely new world?

_This,_ he writes, _is the place from which I cannot return. This is the place of despair, and the place of doubt._

_This is the end._

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

She walks in the whisper of darkness where the shadows meet the light. Her feet scarcely touch the ground as she shifts forward and back, lofting herself through time. And what a time it is.

The rook— _his_ little rook—is more trouble than before. Her toe grazes the chess piece but leaves it be. She is growing tired of these games. The end is near. _He_ grows nearer every passing moment, and she can feel the fear growing in her bones like a disgusting, vile sickness. No, it is time for this game to finish.

She needs her power back.

Perhaps at one time, when she was not conscious of all she is now, she would be lonely. Her most valuable piece, the Demon Eater, beheaded by his own creation; her lovely little hunter stabbed, his body gone. Even her little demon evades her, stolen away by the death-whisperer.

Any loneliness is eclipsed by her desire to win. It consumes her.

“Kozume,” she whispers through the abyss. Somewhere, waiting, she can feel him stop. “Kozume. I will win.

“Your friends will be gone. You will be alone.” Like her. “You will suffer as I suffer. You will fear as I fear.

“Kozume. Wait for me. I am coming.”

He will. She knows he will. He has before.

Kozume has always been waiting for her.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It’s a Sunday that finds Kunimi sprawled in bed for the majority of the day, too lazy to get up and too warm to find the motivation. It’s quiet; Oikawa has taken to roaming around the property in search of motivation for his baby autobiography. Bokuto is out working on the gazebo again, Akaashi is studying at the cafe, and Kuroo is—

—walking in. Naked.

“Uh,” the vampire says, grabbing a shirt from the hamper and using it to cover his…places. “Hey there, kiddo. Didn’t realize you were in here.” 

He’s still dripping from the shower a bit, a towel hung over his shoulders to catch the droplets as they fall from his hair. Kunimi lets out a little noise and snuggles further into the covers, catching the edge of a smile on Kuroo’s face.

“Lazy day in?” The vampire asks, waddling over to the closet and shuffling through for some clean boxers. “Amazing. I’ll join.”

Kunimi eyes the vampire’s back, eyes running over the strange pattern of scars. They spiral together in some kind of strange scripture.

“Your back looks messed up,” he says quietly. Kuroo pauses before tugging on a black tee and flopping next to him on the bed. He wriggles closer, and Kuroo chuckles before pulling the little demon into an embrace.

“Yeah. I asked Kenma to do it. I just, I feel like I was going a little crazy, always worried about if someone was going to control me again. There are some…negatives to it, but this is insurance. Makes it impossible for it to ever happen again.”

“Then I’m glad,” Kunimi says. Kuroo smiles.

“Thanks, kid. I am too.”

“Do you think Oikawa is going to die?”

Wow, what a turn.

“We’re gonna do everything we can to protect each other, Kunimi. Just like before.”

Kunimi presses his face to Kuroo’s chest and takes a shaky breath in.

“She told me he was going to die,” he whispers. “Sometimes I dream about it. It’s awful. But I don’t want to worry anyone more than I already have…”

“Aw, buddy,” Kuroo hugs him closer. And closer. And closer, until Kunimi is squirming away from him and making protesting noises. “Hahaha, no no, I’m gonna squeeze the scared right out of you—“

They spend the rest of the day like that. Chatting, catching up, just enjoying each other’s company. And by the end of it Akaashi joins them, and Oikawa and Bokuto bring them dinner in bed, and they all watch a movie on Bokuto’s phone. And it’s late into the night when they’re nearly all asleep that Kunimi reaches out over the expanse of limbs and grips Kuroo’s hand tightly.

“Thank you,” he whispers. But Kuroo is already asleep.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Just don’t forget to keep this on at all times,” Akaashi worries at the necklace around Oikawa’s neck. “I know it’s a little itchy because of the sage, but it’ll protect you. Please.”

Oikawa pecks him on the cheek.

“I will,” he promises. “No more doing things without telling everyone.”

Akaashi gives him a weak smile. “You know, I really love you. I’m so lucky to have you in my life.”

“Oh, Keiji,” Oikawa grins. He reaches out and pulls his arms over Akaashi’s shoulders, burying his head into the witch’s neck and nuzzling as close as possible. “Love you too. Thank you for trusting me to do this without you guys despite everything that’s been happening.”

“Oi,” Iwaizumi growls. “It’s not like you’re going alone!”

“Right, I have my lovely Iwa-chan to scare away any cuties~”

Akaashi looks between them with a fond expression. 

“Keep each other out of trouble,” he says. “Also, if you come back and the gazebo isn’t done, don’t say anything to Koutarou. I think he’s taking it a little personally.”

“It’s still not leveled?” Iwaizumi asks incredulously. Akaashi shrugs.

“Her spell hasn’t fully worn off him. Anyway, I’ll grab Kunimi.”

As soon as he’s up the stairs Iwaizumi turns on his friend.  
“You have the tea?” He asks. Oikawa rolls his eyes and nods. “And the extra?” Nod. “And the salt crystals?”

“I really don’t think those do anything.”  
“And the bible?”

Oikawa gives him a flat look. “Now you’re just fucking with me. We’re gonna be fine, Iwa-chan. I just…need to figure out what’s going on in my head. I don’t know if it’s because she’s been actively trying to fuck us up, or because of the seasons, or what…but I want to figure this out. I don’t want to lose my memories and I need some place I can just _think_.”

Iwaizumi pulls him in for a hug.

“You’re an obnoxious brat,” he mutters. “But what I said those months ago still stands. We’re gonna love you whatever way you turn out.”

Oikawa nods against his shoulder.

“I know,” he says, “but thanks for saying so.”

Akaashi descends the stairs with a sleepy Kunimi in tow. The demon is far too overdressed for the weather—probably Akaashi’s doing—but looks excited to be getting out of the house.

“You ready?” Iwaizumi asks him, releasing Oikawa so he can ruffle the littler demon’s hair. Kunimi shrugs out from underneath his hand and grumbles incoherently. Iwaizumi and Oikawa share a look, and Oikawa opens the door.

“Okay, then,” he says. “We’re off.” He pauses at the door. Something feels…

“Love you!” He tells Akaashi. There’s a funny look on the witch’s face, like something is…

“Love you too,” Akaashi says.

“Bye, house. Bye, gazebo,” Oikawa says. “Hopefully you’re done by the time we get back!”

“Three days is a short amount of time for an entire gazebo,” Iwaizumi says.

They begin their trek into the woods. Oikawa looks back over his shoulder when he reaches the tree line. The house—the _home_ stands in solidarity against the swathe of nature. It’s got a lot of weird parts hanging out from Bokuto’s side projects. There are a lot of dead flowers that Akaashi keeps saying he can revive. A broken porch step from when Bokuto transformed while drunk and tried to give Kunimi and Hinata a ride. It almost feels like it’s reaching out to him, keeping him rooted to the ground, urging him to come home. 

He smiles and turns away.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kuroo can feel the sticky remains of someone trying to control him and feels so powerful. The longer the feeling stays the more confident he becomes, the safer he feels. Kenma’s power is keeping him safe. _Kuroo’s_ power is keeping himself safe.

He’ll never be controlled again. And that—whatever she is can try all she like, but it won’t happen.

“Yo,” Kuroo says. “Where’s Tooru?”

Bokuto reaches out his arms and wraps them around Kuroo’s waist, burying his face into Kuroo’s stomach.

“Dunno,” he answers, voice muffled. “Haven’t seen him all day.”

“Well, both him and Akaashi forgot to drink their tea today,” Kuroo says. Bokuto frowns and draws away to turn his head over to the kitchen counter. Sure enough, to untouched mugs are sitting on the counter.

“Oh. I thought they went down here to drink them a while ago…”

“Oh, fuck. Think she’s trying to mess with their heads?”

They share a look.

“Well,” Kuroo sighs, “we’d better start looking. I think I saw Keiji around the garden when I came in, let’s go check on him first.” He reaches out and holds Bokuto’s hand as they hurry out the front door and off the porch to the side garden. Sure enough, Akaashi is there. He’s massacring the roses in a sorry attempt at pruning.

“Keiji!” Bokuto exclaims, leaping onto their boyfriend. Akaashi lets out a startled noise and falls under the weight, sending them both sprawling to the ground around the petals. Unable to contain his laughter, Kuroo presses his hand to his mouth to hide it from their resident witch.

“Yo,” he chokes out. “You didn’t drink your tea this morning.”

“What? Yes I did,” Akaashi says. “Tooru and I went down to drink it before he left.”

“Well, unless you—wait, back up. He…left? Alone? For where?”

“Don’t be silly,” Akaashi says as he gets up. He holds out a hand and pulls Bokuto up as well. “Iwaizumi and Kunimi went with him. He says he needs to go back to where he spent a lot of his time before, well, us. It’s to help with his memories.” He sighs. “To be honest, I think he just needs some distance from everything that’s happening. So yeah, I helped him go. Don’t worry, he can handle himself and I gave him some wards and an extra thermos of tea just in case.”

“You let him go,” Kuroo repeats. “With _her_ creation. Away from the house. With an ancient, all-powerful serial killer on the loose.”

Akaashi blinks back at him slowly and Kuroo can practically see the hood being thrown over those sharp brown eyes.

“Okay,” Kuroo says firmly. “We need to get you into the house and drinking that tea so we can figure out exactly what happened.”

“I told you I already—“

“Keiji. I love you. Please humor me.”

Akaashi’s mouth opens and closes a couple times. Kuroo can physically see him fighting the spell, and it looks like Bokuto’s able to smell it on him as well.

“It’s not a big deal,” Akaashi says weakly. “That he left. He’s safe. He’s safe in the woods. We don’t have to find him, we’re—we’re so busy. Spring is coming; I need to get the garden ready. Bokuto needs to finish the gazebo.”

“Fuck the gazebo!” Kuroo snaps. He nods to Bokuto, who subtly shifts his footing. “Akaashi. Babe. Just come with me, we can go have some tea and relax together. Don’t you want that?”

He reaches out and has a split second to jerk away from the sliver of magic that the witch throws out. 

“Fuck! Bokuto—“ Kuroo starts, wondering exactly how long their boyfriend has been under her spell. He twists around and finds Bokuto wrestling Akaashi to the ground, his eyes glowing on the cusp of a transformation. Whatever they’re interacting with right now, it’s caused by _her_. Even when she isn’t able to get him, she’s going after the ones he loves. Kuroo’s heart seizes up.

“Get off of me!” Akaashi hisses, fighting Bokuto’s hold. Bokuto is relentless, grabbing on tight enough to leave bruises and growling low in his throat until Akaashi sags in submission. Then the wolf carefully gets to his feet, Akaashi limp and angry in his arms, and starts making his way to the porch.

“Tetsu,” he grunts. Kuroo snaps out of his thoughts and rushes past them, propping the door open with his shoe and hurrying into the kitchen to grab the tea and decides to put on another kettle for the three of them.

He has a feeling this is going to be a long couple of days.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“I can’t believe I did that,” Akaashi whispers. His hands are buried in his hair. “I can’t _believe_ I did that! Fuck! What was I thinking?!”

“It’s okay, bro,” Bokuto consoles him, patting him between the shoulder blades. He and Kuroo are sandwiching the witch in on their couch, coaxing his memories out with careful and direct questions. The tea helped Akaashi think clearly again, but even he is having trouble recalling exactly what happened.

“I said he went with Kunimi?” He asks. Kuroo nods.

“And Iwaizumi. Look, I’m sure he’ll be ok because it’s him. And neither of us blame you. But we need to figure out what it is we need to do to keep her the fuck out of your heads.”

“Our heads,” Bokuto mumbles absentmindedly. Kuroo takes a breath.

“Right. So here’s what I think. I’m gonna grab Kenma, you guys are gonna find Futakuchi, and we’re gonna sit down and put together a solid plan. I think—“

They’re cut off by a terrifying crack. The lights go out, bathing them in a strange, purple hue of light. Kuroo looks outside and curses.

A storm.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Where did this rain even come from?!” Oikawa yells into the chaos. It pierces him through his rain jacket, and he holds up a forearm to protect his eyes as Iwaizumi spreads his wings and shields them. 

Kunimi reaches out for Oikawa’s hand and holds on tight, his fingers bony and long. Oikawa holds onto him tightly, trying to draw him behind. God, they should’ve known better than to bring their little one with them. He isn’t safe, not with _her_ around.

They sprint through the rain until they reach a thicker grove of trees, and then slow down to take a head count. Iwaizumi shakes out his wings as Oikawa looks around, Kunimi still clinging tightly to his hand. 

The grove is…beautiful.

Haunting.

It’s in a strange way, it reminds Oikawa of Ushijima. Of…of home.

He looks over and finds Iwaizumi gazing at him in a peculiar way. The angel opens his mouth to say something when a searing pain runs up Oikawa’s hand.

“Ow,” he hisses. “Kunimi, you’re gripping too hard.”

Kunimi doesn’t respond.

“Hey, you’re hurting me—my knuckles—“

Oikawa lets out a terrifying yowl when Kunimi’s thumb forces Oikawa’s knuckles to align as his hand crushes them together. 

“Fuck, Kunimi—“

Oikawa shoves at the hand and ends up falling from the force of his movement, shuffling back on his palms and feet to get away. Kunimi…

No.

Whatever this thing is, it’s not Kunimi. It can’t be.

_You finally left._

The voice comes to his mind like a whisper from the shadows. Oikawa squeezes his eyes shut as goosebumps race up his spine, and when he opens them again, Iwaizumi is gone. The rain is frozen midair; even Kunimi is motionless with his unseeing eyes and his ashen skin. 

_You finally left._ She tells him. He cannot ignore her.

_I have been waiting for so very long._

He curls up against the base of a tree, knees to his chest as he tries to breathe through the panic. What should he do? What should he do? 

What if she kills him?

The thought is like ice down his back, and his mind is suddenly frantically piecing together any chance of escape. But…escape from what? How did she find him? How is she so all-powerful to manipulate them all? How—

_You look everywhere for the truth, yet all you see are lies._

She stands in the clearing, a breath away from Kunimi. He remains motionless, frozen in time, a raindrop halfway splashed over the bridge of his nose. She loops her arm around his chest and cups his porcelain jaw, and gazes across the clearing to where Oikawa huddles.

_I have been watching._

He tries to put it together.

_I have always been watching._

He doesn’t know what to do.

_I helped you escape._

God.

_I helped you grow._

How—

_I sacrificed thousands of years for you. I was shackled for you._

Oikawa would have noticed her, would have seen—

_I risked everything for you. My Lord._

And suddenly, it clicks.

And suddenly, he sees.

“He had no memories,” Oikawa whispers. He can’t take his eyes off of Kunimi’s emptiness. “He didn’t even have a name. We gave him one when—“

_When you helped him escape._

God. 

Oh, God.

Oikawa can’t stop shaking. He stumbles to his feet, drunk off of despair and anger.

“Don’t do this,” he gasps, staggering forward. “Don’t do this. Please, don’t do this. Please, God, don’t take him from me. Don’t take him from me.”

For the first time, she opens her mouth. Her voice is a whisper, through the eons and the space of a thousand lives.

“I cannot take away what never existed in the first place.”

And then it’s there. Just barely, a flicker of recognition. Of _pain._ And the doubt leaves Oikawa entirely.

“You’re wrong,” he says confidently.

“I never am.”

“Yes, you are. You can create a life, and you can tell it what to do,” he steps forward as he speaks, eyes trained on his blasphemy. “But once that life is created, it’s out of your hands. He has beliefs. Thoughts. Love. He has a family. Things that you never gave him, never told him to have. He made those things himself. And you can’t touch them. And you can’t destroy them.”

She eyes him with interest.

“I am the one who provides him magic to survive,” she tells him simply. Her smile is a thousand smiles wrapped into a bow. “You want to destroy me? He will be a doll. Motionless. No soul to save, no ability to pass on. He will be trapped, with this created thoughts and beliefs, for eternity.” She draws near. “He will feel his bones rot in the earth as his brain decays and stutters, and still he will live. Motionless, helpless. Alone.

“But he doesn’t have to be. He can live. Safe. Happy. With you, you and your friends. I will protect them. I’ll keep them safe.”

“Safe,” Oikawa whispers. 

“Safe. Don’t you want them to be safe, my Lord?” He nods frantically and she knows she has him. “There is a way. A way to keep them safe.”

“Tell me.”

She smiles that thousand smile and thumbs his cheekbone.

_Kill them._

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

For the life of him, Oikawa cannot recall what happened next. One moment she was there, and the next…

He wipes his hands on his jeans. They’re covered in—

Well.

Angel feathers litter the grove. Angel feathers, and fur. And…blood. He plucks a feather from where it’s poking into his jeans, and fiddles with it for a moment.

“Oh!” He looks across a small clearing and finds a little fox playing coy, peeking at him through the branches. He loves finding his summon in the wild, and reaches out to greet it. They always warm up to him and he—

It runs.

He blinks. Did he frighten it? How? They’ve never run from him before.

Oh well, he thinks. Now what?

Home.

That’s right. He needs to go home. To see his family, his loved ones.

To keep them safe.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

When Oikawa leaves the grove everyone lets out a sigh of disbelief. 

“What the hell was that?” Hanamaki croaks as Matsukawa nuzzles into him. “Who _was_ that?”

Iwaizumi says nothing, too focused on Kunimi. The little demon is…it’s horrifying. He has blood everywhere, his heart is just a gaping hole in his chest. He’s alive, barely, but it’s like no one’s there. His eyes can track Iwaizumi’s finger from side to side but they show no hint of recognition.

“What are you doing here?” He asks finally. If they hadn’t shown up, hadn’t yanked Kunimi to away—

Matsukawa is the one who answers.

“We wanted to ask how Oikawa was going along. Kyou’s—he’s not doing too hot. He needs help.”

“We can’t,” Iwaizumi rasps.

“You promised—“

“Well we _can’t_!” The angel stands, his eyes alight with fury. “My best friend just turned into some kind of soulless monster and tried to _kill us all_ because some all-powerful primordial witch decided to take control! And guess what? He’s probably going back to—oh my god. Fuck, oh, fuck, he’s going back to the house.” Iwaizumi flips open his phone and prays to heaven that someone answers him. Kuroo’s goes straight to voicemail. Akaashi’s rings for a couple seconds before clicking off. And Bokuto’s—

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Hello?”

Bokuto blinks as Iwaizumi’s voice frantically runs through a blur of words.

“Uh…” Bokuto gives Akaashi and Kuroo a bewildered shrug and covers the receiver with his hand. “Iwa wants us to skedaddle.”

“What?” Kuroo asks.

“Ask him why,” says Akaashi. Bokuto sighs.

“Yo, ‘waziumi, why are you—uh, wait what?” He pushes his boyfriends out of the way and looks outside. “No. No, I don’t see him. Why? What? _What?_ ”

And then, something happens.

It’s not immediate. But much like a shadow passing over just before the fall of rain, Bokuto changes. His eyes sharpen, and he takes a breath before hanging up and putting hands on both of his boyfriends’ shoulders.

“We have to go.”

“What?” Akaashi exclaims. “You can’t just—“

“ _We have to go_ ,” Bokuto says. “Do you understand? We have to go. Now. I don’t ask a lot of you guys. I don’t keep things from you. But I’m asking you now: trust me. Trust me that it’s better if you don’t know. We need to go, and I don’t know if we’ll be back.”

It takes them less than three minutes. They don’t grab much—the house still carries remnants of them even as Akaashi uses his magic to sweep it all away. Shoes go into the bin in the storage closet as throw blankets fold themselves neatly in the linen room; food vanishes instantly, leaving no crumb behind; the books begin to align themselves on the thick oak shelves of Kuroo’s room-turned-study. Even the gazebo, unfinished as it is, rightens itself.

When Bokuto has them by the wrists, pulling them towards their beaten truck, he stiffens and lets out a gasp.

“Look at the car,” he breathes. “Just look at the car, get inside, and close your eyes. Don’t look.”

“Don’t look at what?!” Akaashi asks, but his eyes remain glued to the car. He quickly goes towards shotgun and hops in, pressing his forehead to the dash to keep curiosity at bay. Kuroo feels a prickle down his spine and takes a moment. He stops walking.

“Tetsu,” Bokuto begs. “Please, just trust me.”

“Someone—someone has to wait for Tooru,” Kuroo says.

“Babe—“

“No!” Kuroo rips his hand away and takes a step back. He—he can’t. He loves all of his boyfriends so, so much, but—

He can’t.

Not without Tooru.

“I know,” Bokuto’s expression crumples for a moment. “I’m scared, too. But we have to go.”

Kuroo feels numb as he gets into the car. Akaashi reaches back without looking, and Kuroo takes his hand and doesn’t feel it. He doesn’t…he can’t—

As Bokuto drives away, Kuroo can’t help it. The sense of dread rolls over his shoulders as he senses something terrible coming near.

And he feels so numb.

And he looks.

Tooru stands at the edge of the property. He wears loose brown trousers and a billowing white shirt, with no shoes. With no expression. He watches Kuroo through the rear view window without an ounce of recognition. And Kuroo can’t help it. Tears stream down his cheeks as he waves goodbye.

He looks away almost immediately. But if he hadn’t, he would have seen a tear drip down that empty, empty face.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

They reach the bakery in record time. The second they arrive Akaashi begins setting up the wards, expression pained as Bokuto leads a muted Kuroo to the porch. Kenma is there when they knock on the door, Futakuchi at his side. The brunette is still covered in bruises and plasters; his eyes make him look cold. Haunted.

“Come in,” he says. They do.

Tsukishima is inside, his arms wrapped around his thin frame. The entire flock is there; most are hovered protectively around Tsukishima, but Kiyoko and Sugawara are elsewhere. Blood leaks over the ground.

“Follow me,” Futakuchi says. His voice is raspy and they note the bruises ringed around his throat. “They’re over here.”

“Who?” Akaashi asks, joining them after his spellwork. And then they reach the backroom, and freeze.

Bokuto rushes over first, quickly followed by Akaashi, to where Iwaizumi and Sugawara are hovered over Kunimi’s body. He looks…ghastly. Horrible. And so, so small.

“God,” Akaashi chokes out. He cups one of Kunimi’s tiny hands in his own and holds it close to his chest. “Oh, God, Kunimi, no.” Bokuto collapses down beside them and plasters himself to Akaashi’s back in comfort.

Kuroo looks at them, and he knows what he sees there. He knows what his place is.

“What happened?” He asks. 

Futakuchi surveys the room and whispers back, “not here,” before slipping silently away. Kuroo spares his boyfriends one last glance before following. They end up in a private room, what looks to be an office. Kenma joins them with three mugs of tea.

“We found them at the orchard,” Kenma says. 

“The wolves, the main pack, helped them escape,” Futakuchi croaks. “But refuse to help beyond that. Can’t blame them.”

“And…and Tooru?”

Kenma places a hand delicately on top of Kuroo’s. “I’m sorry, Tetsurou. I know…how much he meant to you.”

Kuroo wants to cry. He wants to scream, to bash something in. He wants to see his boyfriend again. He wants to be held by the boyfriends he has left. Mostly, he’s tired.

Mostly, he’s numb.

“So he’s gone,” Kuroo says blankly. 

“He’s—misplaced,” Kenma corrects. “He can be brought back, but it won’t be simple and it won’t be easy. And someone needs to stop her. I can’t do both.”

“Both?”

They turn towards the room from which they came, and suddenly Kuroo understands.

Oh.

He wants to feel something more than this strange, bleak emptiness as he goes to speak, but nothing else comes. No other emotions.  
“We both know what he would have wanted,” Kuroo whispers. Futakuchi shifts and leans against his desk, and the wood creaks at the weight of it.

“You don’t want to talk to the other two?”

Kuroo wants to, maybe. Or maybe he doesn’t. It’s hard to tell when he just feels so numb.

“No,” he says carelessly. “No, I don’t. Do it. Whatever it takes.”

Kenma nods slowly and leaves the room. Futakuchi nudges Kuroo’s knee with his foot and jerks his head.

“I have some voodoo whiskey in the back and a wraparound porch. Let’s go.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Akaashi and Bokuto sit in the back of the room pressed to the wall as they watch Kenma step in for the angels. He reaches out his hands with an ominous black mist as Kunimi starts thrashing about, coughing up this awful black sand. Iwaizumi, looking ready to pass out, leaves. So does Sugawara, probably to go to his flock with an update.

“What will we do when he wakes up? If…if he wakes up?” Akaashi whispers. “Tooru is—you said he was—“

“I don’t know what he is,” Bokuto whimpers. “I’m sorry. I just couldn’t let you see him like that. Like—not himself. That wasn’t him. Whoever it was, it wasn’t him. And I didn’t want what might be our last memory of him to be—“

Akaashi squeezes their hands together and manages a smile. “I know. Thank you.”

“He’s not gone,” Kenma says softly. He’s still drawing that ugly black sand from Kunimi’s body. “Oikawa Tooru. He’s not gone. Just…” He breathes. “Scattered.”

“Scattered?”  
Kenma considers. “Across your lives. Across your memories. But most of all…across the house. He couldn’t step foot on the property when you left, could he?”

“He—I don’t think so,” Bokuto says. “But we would’ve been sitting ducks just waiting for him—“  
“I’m not questioning your decision to leave,” Kenma clarifies. “You were right to get out of there. Iwaizumi was right to tell you to. Did you ever wonder why there was a house in the woods?”

“What?”

“I thought it was strange,” Akaashi whispers. Bokuto turns to him in surprise. “When I saw the ad in the paper that Tooru—I just, I thought it was strange. Who puts a house in the middle of the woods? It’s not a cabin. It’s not near town. I couldn’t even find records of it anywhere.”

Bokuto frowns. “Then how did it…?”

“Homes have power,” Kenma murmurs. “And people are drawn to them like moths to a flame. When Oikawa escaped his bondage for the first time, he did not find that house. It found him. It found him when it was little more than a wreck in the woods. Abandoned. Empty. And he put power into that home, and it gave him power in return.

“Maybe it belonged to a coven, before. Or a pack. Or some unruly group of young adults in need of a safe place to sleep. And when he found it, it was cold. Dark. And in his desperation, he gave it what he wanted. He gave it attention, and tenants. Care. That house loved him the way cafes love their bakers. Of course that creature of remains couldn’t step foot inside.”

“The pantry,” Akaashi realizes. “The pantry was lined with wood that trapped demons inside of it. But somehow, he never…”

Kenma smiles. 

“Oikawa Tooru is the owner of the house,” he says. “And it is only to the owner that it will cede. So just…know that he is still here. There is still a part of him that is here. And as long as that is true, there’s hope.”

“And then we can bring him back?” Bokuto asks, voice tinged with desperation. Kenma smiles tightly.

“No. I don’t think so. But you can try.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“This is either a very bad idea,” Kuroo hiccups, “or a very, very good idea.”

“Good. Definitely good.” Iwaizumi knocks back another glass neat and holds it out. Futakuchi, strewn horizontal over his porch swing, swings his arm around with the glass to fill up the cup the angel holds out. 

“Forgot how strong this shit is,” Futakuchi rasps. “Fuck. I think my feet are going numb.” He slumps against Kuroo’s shoulder and promptly falls asleep.

They’re quiet for a moment before Kuroo says, “I just can’t believe he’s gone.”

Iwaizumi turns in disbelief.

“You don’t seriously think—“

Kuroo’s look of pure emptiness makes the angel stop.

“I do,” Kuroo shrugs. “I thought losing them wouldn’t hurt. I mean—I thought it would hurt. Of course it would hurt. But I didn’t think it would hurt like this. And yeah, I still have Akaashi and Bokuto, and I love them, but they—they don’t need me. It was like Oikawa was the glue that held us together, and without him I’m just on the outside. Fuck, I’m so fucked up. And the worst part is, the only one who ever made me feel like I wasn’t—like I _really_ wasn’t—was him. Him. And now, what. He’s just…gone? So yeah, I do think. I think he’s fucking dead. I think whatever the _fuck_ that thing was, it wasn’t him. He’s gone. He has to be gone. Because if he isn’t—“ Kuroo stops to release a sob. “What he did to Kunimi, I can’t—I just can’t. I can’t. I hope he’s dead. I hope he’s been dead for hours. I hope whatever happened in that forest, when we bring him back he doesn’t remember any of it. Because it wasn’t him. It wasn’t him.”

Iwaizumi reaches out a hand and rests it over Kuroo’s, even though they both keep their eyes on the skyline.

“He loved you guys so much,” he says eventually.

“He was a damn fool.”

Iwaizumi swallows. His voice is hoarse when he murmurs, “If he’s still in there, we have to help him. But if he’s not…you know we’re the ones who will—who will have to—“

“Yeah,” Kuroo says sadly. “Yeah, I know.” He takes a long drink. “This won’t be the first time I hunt someone I love.”

They sit quietly and stare into the night for answers, but nothing comes to them. Iwaizumi lets his hand rest like a blanket on Kuroo’s neck and wishes the other two could be here. But he knows it’s futile; Oikawa had a plan that they now have no choice but to follow. Akaashi and Bokuto are strong. But this…to do this…

It has to come from weakness.

“God. Even when I’m so angry with him, I would give anything just to hold him again,” the angel whispers.

Kuroo stares out, expression drawn. He lets the bottle roll over his lips again before taking a breath. 

“Looking back on it,” the vampire murmurs, “we were losing him long before we ever realized. That’s why it was so hard to see in the end. And he could tell. On some level, he sensed it. He knew he wasn’t gonna get out of this easy.”

Iwaizumi stands, helping a half-conscious Futakuchi to his unsteady feet.

“We’ll get through this,” he says confidently.

Kuroo’s lips twitch in the cusp of a smile. “We will.”

He knows they will. Has no doubt. Kenma can take on _her_. And the rest—well, Kuroo and Iwaizumi have it covered. No need to taint Akaashi and Bokuto with that kind of burden. They deserve to be—

“There you are!”

All three stop. Akaashi is there, his eyes wide and swollen from crying. He reaches out and gathers Kuroo into his arms.

“I’m sorry we didn’t check on you sooner,” he says. Kuroo stands there. Numb. He can hear Iwaizumi ushering Futakuchi away for privacy. “Kunimi is…he’s not well. But between Kenma and I, we think he’ll be ok. I don’t know what happened on that hike, but it really did a number on his soul. He’s mostly unresponsive.”

This, Kuroo thinks, is what Akaashi should be doing. Helping people. Taking the clear path. The witch has already gone through so much, and he doesn’t have a stable coven to keep him straight. He can’t be the one to…

“Thanks for taking care of him,” Kuroo replies. He presses his face into Akaashi’s dark, greasy hair. God but they could all use a shower. He grins and tucks further into his boyfriend, trying to expel the weight on his shoulders. 

“I love you,” Akaashi says. “how are you doing?”

Kuroo thinks about his past. He thinks about his first few years as a hunter. How familiar this all is. Mercy killing, they called it.

He knows he can’t do that now. Maybe Iwaizumi thinks so, but Kuroo—there’s no way. He has to think of a way to bring Oikawa back. One that doesn’t involve—

“I’m ok,” he says. He wants so badly to not be numb. But he’s terrified. He’s so scared he can’t do this if he feels things again. He shouldn’t have looked. Seeing Oikawa like that…seeing such a lack of self… “I love you too. Let’s go back inside.”

He thinks of Iwaizumi, and Kunimi, and his boyfriends. Kenma. And he knows exactly what he needs to do.

They turn back with their hands locked, and he feels nothing.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Oikawa can’t remember where he is or what he’s doing. 

It feels like he’s…trapped? But at the same time, like he’s floating. Like the world is spinning past him and he doesn’t have the ability to interact with, let alone understand, it. Searching for answers is like grasping at straws and he isn’t sure how to get out of this headspace. It’s hard to think.

He tries to focus on the little things that stick in his memories. Kunimi’s cold little hands that he loves to stick under people’s sweaters. Tsukishima’s sharp laughter. The feeling of Bokuto’s teeth when it’s close to the full moon and they start itching, when he starts wanting to chew on everything and everyone in sight. Akaashi, the smell of worn leather and basil and something dark. How Kuroo’s eyes light up as he talks, his brain moving a thousand paces ahead of everyone else. Iwaizumi’s calloused palms.

He remembers back before they had revealed their identities. God, what a long time ago. Or was it? 

_“Hi,”_ Bokuto had said, or something along those lines. _“I’m here because you left an ad online about a house in the woods? I, uh, like to go on long runs out there. Y’know, clear my head and stuff. How much is rent? I didn’t miss the deadline for applying, did I?”_

Bokuto had been easy. And prior to Bokuto, of course, came—

_“Akaashi Keiji.” The man extends his hand out in a formal greeting, his dark brown eyes flickering over the furniture. “I realize this is short timing, but it’s very nice to meet you. This house has a very…well, it’s quite soothing. Something about it relaxes me.”_

It had been…awkward, for a little while. Bokuto seemed to be very nervous around the witch, constantly torn by aborted motions towards the smaller man. A hand outstretched before ruffling hair; the way Bokuto would lean in towards Oikawa when they sat together on the couch, but always kept distance from Akaashi. Later Oikawa would learn that it was because Bokuto thought Akaashi was uncomfortable around touchy people and was afraid of making a fool of himself. Still, the ice wasn’t really broken until—

_Kuroo walked up to the house with a duffle bag and an armful of case files and claimed the place his own. It took only fifteen minutes for him to make himself right at home; whereas Oikawa secluded himself to give the others space, Akaashi kept himself orderly, and Bokuto contained his things to avoid annoying others, Kuroo simply threw his things on the floor and flopped onto the couch for a nap. He didn’t even wait to introduce himself until after waking up—they’d later learn he was coming off the conclusion of a six month case._

_“Oh,” he’d said when he woke up, popping his shoulders and strolling over to the kitchen where they were all making individual dinners. “I didn’t think you’d all cook separately. I’m gonna order a pizza, how about I make it a double-extra-large?”_

_Oikawa could feel the way Bokuto and Akaashi eyed each other warily._

_“Pizza…sounds good,” Akaashi agreed._

After that, it had only been a matter of time.

Come to think of it, he realizes, he misses his boyfriends a lot. Something feels very wrong. Like there’s something standing at his back, watching his every move and trying to keep him from understanding. But…understanding what? 

He thinks he sees something out of the corner of his eye and turns to look when everything fades to black.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“He’s finally asleep,” Bokuto whispers in Akaashi’s ear. Kuroo is spread out across their laps like a cat, belly up so that Akaashi can graze his fingers over it gently. Sometimes they brush over the hint of metal—a dagger. The hilt gives off the same aura as ashwood; a complicated dance of ashwood and silver that surely comes with aztec linings.

“Something’s very wrong,” Akaashi whispers back. They don’t want to wake their sleeping vampire. “His soul…it’s all wrong. I think this might be too much for him. I don’t know what to do.”

Oikawa was always the one to help them in times like these.

“Well,” Bokuto murmurs, “I don’t think it’s too much.”

Akaashi crooks an eyebrow and waits for him to continue.

“I—I mean, just look at him! He’s been through _so much_ , Akaashi. We have to believe that he’ll push through. I know right now he’s hurting, and he needs us, but we have to believe that he can get through because he won’t, so he’ll need us to believe enough for all four of us.”

Akaashi can’t help it. He weeps.

“Sorry,” he bats away Bokuto’s hand with his own, his right hand coming up to rub the back of his wrist to his eyes. “Sorry, I know, I need to be strong. He needs us. But God, Bokuto,” he looks up. “Oikawa’s _gone_. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know if Tetsurou can get through this because I don’t know if _I_ can get through this. I n-never wanted to get close to people the way I did my coven. And n-now it’s happening all over aga—“

He dissolves into silent sobs that wrack through his shoulders. It’s a testament to Kuroo’s bone-deep tiredness that he doesn’t wake up when Akaashi clenches his hands into the cold fabric of the vampire’s jeans. Bokuto’s coal-hot hand rubs up and down his spine.

“I love you,” Bokuto says. “And I love Tetsurou, and I love Tooru. And I’ve never loved anyone else the way I’ve loved you guys, and I never will. And I don’t know if we can get Tooru back. And I don’t know if we’ll make it through this. Things…things happen, Keiji. Awful things. Things that we can’t stop. 

“But I _believe_ that it’s possible. I’m not saying it’s likely, or that it’ll happen. But it _can happen_. And—I dunno. Sometimes that’s just gotta be enough for now. And we’ll take the hits as they come.”

Akaashi doesn’t stop crying. He doesn’t feel any better. But he reaches out with his free hand, and Bokuto holds it tenderly to his chest, and it’s quiet. The three of them are together, and they’re ok. And for now…that will have to be enough.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“The little ones are running from you,” she whispers in his ear. Her nails scrape against his jugular. “They don’t love you anymore. They’re _afraid_ of you. Such a pretty, awful thing you are.”

Oikawa Tooru stands compliantly at the edge of the property.

He can’t remember why he’s there.

He can’t remember much of anything at all, really.

Something, though…

“Have you decided which one you’ll save next? They need you, Tooru, even if they’re afraid.”

Oikawa nods. He knows this already. His little one is already safe—he knows it. He knows it because she tells him so.

“Find them, Tooru. Save them,” she whispers, but he finds he cannot move.

“Tooru!” She snaps.

He stays still, rooted to the edge of the property, and gazes out at the vast expanse of a house. Something…something seems…

He wants to be there. He wants to be…

“The longer you wait the less of them you’ll be able to save.”

Oh.

He sees it now. The gazebo is tilted just a hair, unfinished. Wood is stacked up against the porch that has strange, dead plants everywhere. He wants to…smile? Why? They’re dead plants. He thinks he can taste salt on his tongue, and for just a moment he finds a whisper of a memory.

Suddenly, he’s craving chicken.

“Who do I save?” He asks after a moment. She tuts.

“Have I taken too much from you?” She asks him. He doesn’t respond. “Oh, well. I suppose this makes you more compliant anyhow. You do feel a bit strange to handle. Almost…but not quite angelic. Hm.”

He reaches out and twists through her magic with his fist; his eyes glow as his demonic traits reveal themselves. It feels good. His shirt billows out and his bare feet sink into the muddy earth. Rings pop onto his fingers, heavy and jeweled with emeralds and garnets and moonstones. He finishes with a flick of his fingers and the gazebo rights itself, fully built and painted white. How…nice.

“Why would you do that?” She asks him. He can feel her rooting around in his mind but she won’t find anything; Oikawa himself is confused as to why he’s doing it.

He turns away and ignores the strange pain in his chest. She’s gone now and the rain comes in her wake, and with his back to the house he can’t help but stop and close his eyes. He feels so—distant. No, distant isn’t the right word. He feels…

Nothing.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kuroo wakes up at three in the morning and quietly extracts himself from his boyfriends’ laps. They don’t even stir, and Kuroo bends down and presses kisses to their temples as he throws on his parka.

Iwaizumi is there in the hallway by the time he closes the bedroom door, dressed for the chilly spring evening. The moon is out but the winds are high; they can’t count on moonlight for their encounter. 

They share a curt nod and weave around the smattering of rooms to the bar area.

“You’re awake,” Futakuchi says. He doesn’t look drunk or hungover at all, which is impressive considering how out he was mere hours ago. “Good. Kenma’s been expecting you.”

“He’s here?” Iwaizumi asks, on edge. Futakuchi shakes his head.

“Out. Making sure everything’s the way it should be. Which reminds me, have some tea before you go. To clear your heads. I’ll even brew it myself.”

Kuroo and Iwaizumi share a look before sitting down at the bar. Futakuchi busies himself at the counter and talks to them even as he turns his back to prepare the herbs, glass bottles clattering against glossy old wood.

“You know, I didn’t want to get involved with you guys,” he says. “I knew you were trouble from the second I felt that dumb Demon Lord around town. But I never imagined Kenma getting so attached. He’s been dealing with her for—“ He cuts himself off, lost in a memory. When he comes back to them he continues like nothing happened. “A long time. Longer than any of us can even conceive. And you aren’t the first group of people he’s gotten dragged into this.”

Iwaizumi’s eyes dart to Futakuchi’s wrist and Kuroo follows the gaze to a strange, twisting scar. It runs around the baker’s wrist and up past his shirt sleeve. 

“You were the one dragged in before us,” Iwaizumi says, but Kuroo is the one to put it together.

“You were _one of_ the people dragged in before us,” Kuroo whispers. “How many people did you lose?” Surely someone other than Futakuchi had to’ve…

Futakuchi pauses, then continues mixing together the herbs. “I’m here alone, aren’t I?” 

_Everyone_ , an ugly voice whispers in Kuroo’s head. _He lost everyone. And if this doesn’t work, you will, too._

“Hey, fuckers.” They turn and Kuroo bites back a frown that their conversation is interrupted. “You thought you would leave without me?” Tsukishima asks, eyes full of fire. “Fuck that bullshit. I’m coming. You two idiots are gonna fuck everything up, you overthink everything, and like hell am I not going to take this opportunity to rub it in his face when we save him.”

Futakuchi lets out a bitter laugh. “Kid, that’s not what they’re doing. Or—well.” He pulls out two mugs, then eyes the demon and pulls out a third. “Sit down. We’re having tea.”

“Fuck that, we need to go—“

“ _Sit down_ ,” Futakuchi snarls, eyes flashing blue. Tsukishima sits next to Kuroo, eyes wide. “Now then. Kuroo, you’re getting a special blend partly ‘cause of your new fancy scar work. They need three minutes to seep and then you can go.”

“How is Kunimi doing?” Iwaizumi asks Tsukishima. The demon shrugs, looking fairly unsettled.

“When he comes to, it’s not for long and he’s not himself. It’s like the door’s open but no one is home. I fucking hate it.”

“Kenma can…?” Kuroo begins, eyeing Futakuchi, but the other man just shrugs.

“Who knows what she did to him. We don’t know what we’re dealing with here.” He checks on the teas and slides them across the counter. It smells…rancid. Like death, almost, and there’s a moment where Kuroo catches Iwaizumi looking at Futakuchi like he’s seeing the—man? mage? witch?—for the first time.

“What is this?” Tsukishima recoils from the first sip, and Futakuchi snorts.

“Something only I can make. Now, drink up and get the fuck out. You have a demon lord to find.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

She sits the precipice of the future and the moon shines off the small bits of her that exist in this dimension. Beautiful, like a thousand-scored crystal.

Deadly.

She can feel a faint rumbling in the earth, but nothing that’s too much of a concern. Though she can feel herself losing her grip on her little demon, as mercurial as he is, and that makes her pause. Shifting winds bring ice into her veins. There is part of her that wants to hold on.

There is a part of her that aches to lose.

She took too much from her poor demon lord, and though she uncurls her grasp so slightly on his mind, she has to be careful. Better to keep his soul sated while this is happening; the cognitive dissonance would be too much for her to use him otherwise.

“My poor, pretty thing,” she crows. He doesn’t react; he can’t hear her. Even if she were on his plane of reality, she doubts he could really see her or understand why she’s doing this.

She’s been alive for so long, sometimes not even she knows.

But that’s alright.

“I’m here, Kenma,” she says, and releases her hold on her Lord. He sinks into the earth for a moment, blessedly still. She thinks she sees a building in the distance of the trees and wonders if he’s been circling the house all this time. Waiting for them to come home? He rises. “Find your loves,” she whispers to him. “Find them and save them from this world.”

“I have to save them,” he whispers. In a beat his heart is on the ground, a throbbing black mess, and then he is gone. She is alone. Drifting. Thinking. No—

Waiting.

She’s always been waiting for this.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It doesn’t take long for Tsukishima to realize something’s wrong.

Kuroo has a shifty look about him, the way he keeps his knifes near his hands and his eyes on Iwaizumi’s back. There’s just something about him that’s throwing Tsukishima off—

Oh.

He realizes in a heartbeat that he’s never seen Kuroo really allow himself to transform. Now though, aided by whatever vampire steroids Futakuchi put in that tea, the vampire is fully into it. His ears curl at the edges and his eyes flash a dark, almost violent red in the moonlight. Fog rolls in, and it gives Tsukishima a distinct realization.

Before, he’s only ever seen Kuroo-the-investigator. The big brother, the one who keeps a cool head and shoulders the burdens and makes them all dinner secretly in his room while Akaashi puts away his bountiful dank chicken leftovers. But this…this isn’t that Kuroo.

This Kuroo is a predator.

He walks in a way that silences his footsteps even in the woods, almost like he’s floating. His eyes dart around but always land back on the angel in the lead, frowning to himself every so often. His hand hovers over his knife unconsciously and it puts Tsukishima on edge.

He’s not an idiot.

He knows what Kuroo and Iwaizumi are planning on doing if this goes south. But even with all of this, Tsukishima just doesn’t understand how—

“Holy shit!”

He drops to the ground when Kuroo’s boot tries to implant itself into his chest; where Tsukishima stood a massive shadowy figure stands, fingers outstretched with razor nails waiting to impale. The figure turns, and Tsukishima finds himself looking up into the pale grey face of Oikawa Tooru. 

No, not Oikawa—

The demon lord.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Bokuto,” someone whispers. “Bokuto, wake up.”

“Fuck you,” Bokuto grumbles and turns back into his pillow.

“Wha—“

“Hey, man, get up. Your boyfriend’s about to do something stupid.”

That gets him right up. He glances around and finds himself passed out next to Kunimi in bed.

“What happened?” He asks, letting his eyes filter through the darkness. They finally adjust to the near pitch black room, and he makes out…Hanamaki? “Uh…”

“It’s cool, don’t worry,” the other wolf assures him. “Iwaizumi called in a favor, says you and him have to go save your boyfriend and need us to stick around a while longer and watch the little guy.”

“What?”

The door opens and Bokuto squeezes his eyes shut against the light. He immediately dials in to Akaashi’s scent and leans forward as his boyfriend draws near.

“Kou,” he murmurs, careful of Bokuto’s sensitive hearing. “Tetsurou left with Tsukishima and Iwaizumi. They’re planning on killing—they’re—“ He takes a breath. “Futakuchi told me. They left an hour ago.”

God, with everything going on Bokuto must not have felt Kuroo leave. What kind of a boyfriend is he? He can’t even look after one of his mates properly, and the other—

The other—

“Tetsu wouldn’t do that,” Bokuto says firmly. He can feel Hanamaki’s faint inhale of surprise. “And Tooru won’t kill Tetsu either.”

“Kout—“ Akaashi begins, but Bokuto is firm.

“No. Tetsu might be trying to make himself, or convinced that it’s the only way, but I know him. I love him. And he is not capable of killing one of the people he loves most even if he thinks it’s the right thing to do. And I think he’s going to realize that before anyone else he’s with can hurt Tooru, and—“

“I know!” Akaashi cuts in. Bokuto finally opens his eyes and finds Akaashi smiling at him tiredly. “And I knew you’d think the same. But we need to go, so that when those two idiots are done sorting each other out we can patch them up and take them home.”

Bokuto blinks over at him before shooting out of the bed and launching into a kiss. Hanamaki lets out a startled noise and there’s a clang as he flops onto the hard wood floor, but Bokuto doesn’t care; all he wants is to keep Akaashi in his arms forever and ever.

“I love you,” he says. And then,

“Lets go pick up our idiots.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The thing that’s circling them is definitely not Oikawa. That much, Kuroo knows. Before it felt like he was seeing some sort of doll with nothing going on inside; this, from what he can tell, is like she took the anger and fear and injected it into the demon. 

Tsukishima’s still on the ground, pressed up against a tree trunk. Kuroo thinks he might be going into shock. That’s probably for the best—keeps him out of the fight, and Kuroo doesn’t think Tsukishima has actually interacted with a demon lord before. Not one that he knew so intimately; even Ushijima was a stranger when they faced him.

“Iwaizumi,” Kuroo warns, but isn’t sure what for. Then angel is crouched with his angelic blade in hand, shining in what little light there is. It seems that seeing his friend this way solidified the angel’s resolve.

It takes watching Iwaizumi for him to realize, and by then it’s almost too late. Oikawa lunges forward and Iwaizumi parries, the force of it knocking him back a couple steps. He regroups and swipes with his blade but is too slow; a thin line cuts into Oikawa’s cheek but nothing more. They clash again, and again, and then once more before Oikawa manages to land a blow; his nails slice into Iwaizumi’s wing like it’s made of butter. 

The angel grunts in pain and lashes out, catching the lord’s knee and jerking the back of the blade behind the cap. Kuroo’s whole body jolts as the angel deftly pulls away from the lord, who shrieks over the dislocation and reaches out a hand. Suddenly Iwaizumi’s crumpling, writhing around in pain as if possessed.

Kuroo feels frozen.

He feels…

He feels—

“NO!” He shouts, tackling Iwaizumi when the angel starts to get up, eyes full of anger. Iwaizumi curses as they both go down, and some part of this must be curious to the demon lord because he pauses in his attack and stares down at him as they start to grapple.

“Kuroo what the _fuck_ —“ Iwaizumi wheezes, and that seems to break Tsukishima out of his trance because suddenly the younger demon is getting to his feet, eyes flashing a violent color as crows begin to caw in the distance.

“Stop it, Oikawa!” He shouts. The demon lord turns to him with sharp eyes and Iwaizumi tries desperately to buck Kuroo off of him.  
“Kuroo, he’s going to kill us, get the fuck off of me—“

“No!” Kuroo hisses. “He’s still in there.” He catches Iwaizumi’s wrist just before the butt of the angel’s blade can connect with Kuroo’s temple. It takes Kuroo aback—this isn’t Iwaizumi’s fighting style. He’s firm and uses short jabs with his free hand or feet to get at someone. He doesn’t fight with blades like Kuroo does, and—

“You think I want to do this?” Iwaizumi cries out. “You think this is how I want this to go? I _promised_ him I’d keep him safe. But I know what he’s capable of, Kuroo, and maybe you’re okay with letting Oikawa get as fucked up as you are but I’m not! _We have to do this!_ ”

Kuroo reels mentally but grimaces and throws the angel back into the ground by the shoulders.

“Fuck you! Weren’t we supposed to wait and see if we could bring him back first?! I’m not letting you kill him if there’s even a chance he’s still in there!” Kuroo didn’t even think about angels being affected by her. God, how could he have missed that? He’s probably the only one thinking clearly!

Oikawa’s advancing on Tsukishima slowly, like he isn’t quite sure what to make of the other demon; Kuroo uses this to his advantage and grapples with Iwaizumi, managing to hook an elbow around the angel’s throat to keep him from making any sudden noises. Tsukishima nods to Kuroo subtly, and the vampire nods back. They’re on the same page with this.

“Sorry,” Kuroo whispers. Then he’s using all his body weight to shuffle them out of the clearing and into line of trees. Iwaizumi struggles the entire time, his nails dragging into Kuroo’s skin and his teeth digging into the thin paper of Kuroo’s knuckles. The vampire lets out a punched noise as Iwaizumi digs the butt of his blade back into one of Kuroo’s ribs, but that’s the upside of being a vampire—angels don’t have the kind of pain tolerance he has. 

But he needs more.

“Sorry,” he says again, and kills two birds with one stone. His teeth sink into Iwaizumi’s neck like it’s made of butter, and the angel slumps against him in total surprise. Only a few yards away Tsukishima’s still talking, his voice hurried and scared but also totally resolute.

Everything fuzzes out when the first hit of blood really gets to him. His body feels right again—warm, powerful, vibrant. He takes another drag. He knows he can’t kill Iwaizumi because the angel is already technically dead, but the blood is—well, it’s bad for _Kuroo_. Angel blood isn’t meant to be consumed, not in large quantities at least. He can see why. It’s addictive, but the backlash is going to be pretty nasty.

“You…bastard…” Iwaizumi grunts. Kuroo pulls back for a moment.

“Maybe,” he drawls. “But I’m a bastard who wants us to win. And I want us to do it right.”

With that, he drains until the angel slumps in his arms. He carefully rolls them so that Iwaizumi’s no longer crushing him, and looks around. This—this is fine. The angel will be ok here.

He rolls his shoulders back and jumps back into the clearing only to find the demons at an impasse. Tsukishima looks fucking terrifying, his eyes glowing red and some demonic-looking sword in hand. Maybe this is legion’s true power?

“I may not win,” Tsukishima growls, his voice a thousand voices strung together with a sin, “but I’ll fuck you up so badly you won’t be able to move anymore. And then all of my friends will come here and _slay you_.”

There’s a moment where Kuroo’s barely-beating heart nearly stops, and then he realizes. Tsukishima’s not talking to Tooru—

He’s talking to the demon lord.

The lord doesn’t smile, and it’s for the better. Instead he takes a step forward, his billowing black pants slipping up to reveal a pale, bare foot.

“Why?” He asks curiously. “Why care so much about this? You had no quarrels with my predecessor until those men asked you to care.”

Ushijima. Right.

“Your predecessor was a monster,” Kuroo says. The lord turns to him with passive surprise. “Oikawa Tooru is no monster.”

“Oikawa Tooru,” The lord drawls. “You do this for him. I see. Then this will be easy.” He turns to Tsukishima—Legion?—who takes a step back. “Your instincts lack because you fight against one whose face you recognize. You could hold a thousand better souls in you and lose. I will show you.”

Suddenly he’s right in front of the other demon, his nails long and sharp and as terrifying as his violent crimson eyes. Tsukishima raises his sword an instant too late, his gaze not leaving the Lord’s face, and the Lord rears back his hand and slashes him across the temple and down over the cheek.

Tsukishima crumples to the ground, sword abandoned as blood pours from his brow into his eye. He curls up on the ground instinctively before finally snapping out of it and going for his sword again. It’s almost embarrassing how quick the lord is in comparison, his foot planting down on Tsukishima’s wrist.

“Pitiful,” the lord tuts. Kuroo needs to do something. He needs to _do something_ quick. 

Tsukishima isn’t used to battle. He’s never—he’s not seasoned, he has too much training and little experience no matter what his other souls have to offer.

The clearing is best for the lord, who can move quickly in the open spaces.

“Catch!” Kuroo yells, throwing the first thing in his pocket—one of the little stones Akaashi likes to slip in their pockets for luck. It works, or maybe Kuroo just caught him by surprise, because it gives the lord enough of a startle that Kuroo’s able to leap forward with his angel-induced adrenaline and grip the lord right around the throat, speeding them away from the clearing and deeper into the woods where it’s dark and colder.

The lord breaks free after a few moments of shock, throwing Kuroo into a trunk and standing there, analyzing him. Kuroo takes a beat to gather his breath before swaying back to his feet.

“It’s just you and me, buddy,” he wheezes, wiping away some blood on his lip with the back of his hand. The demon lord snorts and takes a look around the trees.

“You know,” he murmurs, “this is rather poetic. The very place my last predecessor passed, if I recall.”

“I thought you might like the dramatic touch,” Kuroo replies. “Your host always did.”

He feels alive. He feels his body pulsing with power, itching for him to lunge forward and make the lord submit. He feels drugged. But even souped up on angel juice and struggling to feel any emotion outside of the range of ‘numb’ and ‘jittery’, Kuroo knows that that’s a death wish at this point. 

“You can beat this, Oiks,” he says confidently, even though they’re empty words. Oikawa Tooru is a strong person, but that does not mean he’s strong enough. Not yet.

Not without some motivation.

His hands shake a little as he steadies himself and spreads out his arms, trying to come off placating. The lord seems amused by this.

“‘waizumi’s out for the count and Kei is gonna need stitches, probably, but we’re all ok. We’re all gonna be ok, Tooru. I love you.”

This might be the last time he gets to say it. God. It’s selfish, because he can’t ask that of them, but he wishes his boyfriends could be here. Wishes not to be alone.

More than that, though, Kuroo knows he needs to do this. The Lord needs to go or he’ll find Iwaizumi and Tsukishima. He’ll kill them and then go after the others. Kenma will be alone again. _She_ will win.

_I really hope I don’t hit my stomach,_ he thinks. Then he moves.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Are you ready for this?” Kenma asks him. Futakuchi’s smile is haggard.

“Kenma, buddy, I’ve waited centuries for this chance. Don’t tell me you’re doubting me now after all this time.”

Kenma gives him a look and he rolls his eyes.

“Seriously. I’m—I’m _tired_ , Kenma. So goddamn tired.”

Kenma reaches out and grasps Futakuchi’s wrists. He deposits the other in the space between the folds of space in the forest and then pulls, yanking _her_ out of her dimension and onto the Earth.

She eyes him like he’s made of fire.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she rasps after a long while. He doesn’t reply. “Did you miss me, fallen king?”

“No.”

“Well!” She laughs. “I’m strong. I’m stronger than _you_! I proved it before with your little baker, and I’ve proved it again.”

But she hasn’t.

“They’re stronger than you think,” he warns.

“They’re just my pawns. My lovely little pawns in our game.”

“Your game. They were never pawns to me.” Kenma reaches out his hand and the world tightens for a breath before suddenly they’re locked in a power struggle. Neither of them move; they couldn’t if they wanted to. The pressure of their magic coexisting nearly crushes the earth. Kenma can feel himself physically sinking. 

Good. That will make it easier for—

“You know,” she grits, “I didn’t think you would be so weak as to get attached to earthly creatures.”

Kenma almost corrects her. He isn’t as close with the angels, but he considers Iwaizumi a friend. She doesn’t need to know that, though.

They grapple a bit more before finally he feels himself gaining the upper hand, but it’s—well. At first it’s like a release in the air; the oppressive aura that the demon lord radiates flickers and dies. But then—

Then—

It feels like someone is ripping out his lungs. Like he’s moving through water, and he can’t breathe. He can’t _breathe_. He’s never felt like this before. And suddenly, he just knows.

_Kuroo is hurt. Badly._

Just like he’d predicted.

“Futakuchi,” he rasps. They have to get her while she’s still weakened. Futakuchi steps out like a man possessed. His eyes glow a violent, eerie green light as the earth trembles. A hand-like shadow curls around the moon, shading them in a cold blanket as she observes her new opponent.

“Oh,” she says suddenly. “I remember you.”

That’s all she manages to get out. Kenma reaches out a hand and drags her as firmly into their world as he can, and it feels like he’s shredding sandpaper down his palms. The moment she’s really there Futakuchi shifts, his veins lighting up green like someone injected him with neon.

“You’re mine now,” he grins eerily. She stares at him in fascinated horror. 

“What are you?” She hisses. He takes a step forward and the ground begins to bubble up beneath him. A terrifying thumping fills the air, like thousands of hands beat against the surface of the earth.

And then one breaks through.

Kenma watches as the rotted, grotesque hand of Kamasaki Yasushi’s corpse breaks through the mud and clamps onto her very-corporeal ankle. He watches as Kaname Moniwa drags himself out of the mud, hairless and half-bone, and staggers towards her.

She may be more powerful than Futakuchi, more powerful by a long shot, but even Kenma knows he’s got her. She’s too shaken to use her wits or her will. Kenma has the upper hand, and he’ll be keeping it until she dies. 

After all, even as an ally Kenma feels chills running up his spine. Power doesn’t matter here.

Everyone fears a necromancer.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Oh, god,” Akaashi gasps. He’s mid-run when he collapses into the ground, his knees scraping against the cold earth. Something feels so, so wrong. There’s a stale rotting scent in the air that makes him gag, and it feels like something is squeezing his heart.

“Tetsu,” Bokuto croaks. He yanks Akaashi back to his feet and they keep running. “Something—something’s happened to—“

He pauses again to help Akaashi through a thorn patch and Akaashi sighs and pulls him close.

“Go,” Akaashi whispers. He presses a kiss to Bokuto’s lips. “Go. You’re faster. You’re stronger.”

“You’re literally the healer, Keiji. If they’re hurt—“

Akaashi presses a rune stone into Bokuto’s hand. 

“I’ll get there. This will keep anyone from—from dying. But having one of us there early is better than both of us being late.” Plus, if he really does recognize that disgusting rotted feeling, he might be needed elsewhere. “We both know Tooru won’t—I’ll catch up. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

They hug briefly, and there’s a terrible snap as Bokuto transforms. Akaashi watches him go with fear lacing his chest, and then turns.

He’s only ever met a necromancer once, but once was enough. It was—horrible. Draining.

But it won’t be enough. Akaashi looks down at his hands, sees the gray scars from the last time he truly fought.

He knows what he has to do.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“Man,” Kuroo laughs, and then chokes on his own blood. “Even with a gimp knee you still run like a motherfucker.”

“Shut the fuck up you stale bloodbag, oh my god, I swear to god if you die I will drag you back and kill you again myself.”

“I don’t know,” Kuroo laughs again. Everything seems funny to him right now. “I feel dizzy.”

“Fuck! Fuck, Tetsurou, you idiot fucker—“

“Oh! ‘waizumi’s asleep near the clearing.”

“Asleep near the—what the fuck, Tetsu?” 

“You sound like ‘waizumi. Except he was gonna murder you.”

“ _What?!_ ”

“Don’t worry,” Kuroo boops Oikawa on the nose and grins up at him dopily. Oikawa adjusts his princess carry so he can move faster. “I was gonna help.”

“Oh my _god_ that does not make me feel better.” He freezes for a second, his eyes becoming cloudy.

“Fight it,” Kuroo tells him with a loopy grin. “I know it feels like you can’t but you can. I love you.”

“I love you too,” Oikawa says tightly, “you dumb idiot.”

Kuroo just stays there in his arms, hands trying to keep pressure where the hilt of his blade sticks out of his hip. 

“I missed my stomach on purpose,” the vampire adds.

“Please shut up.”

“I finally feel things again. I’m glad I could save you from her. Even if I have to—“

“You’re not dying!” Oikawa snaps. Kuroo blinks up at him.

“Are you crying? That’s so sweet.”

“God,” Oikawa sniffs. “I love you so much, you’re the worst. Where is Kenma? Is he coming?”

“He’s killing her. That’s probably why she hasn’t gotten you back yet.” Kuroo sags a little more. He’s having trouble keeping his head up. “Oh, I bet he’s gonna be pissed at me.”

Oikawa clutches Kuroo tightly to his chest and tries to keep it together. He can’t, though, and he can’t sense Kunimi anywhere, and he doesn’t know where anyone is, and he’s so scared. He finally just drops to his knees and leans against the base of a tree, Kuroo curled up in his lap as much as the gangly vampire can be.

“You know,” Kuroo says as Oikawa weeps, “I’m sorry. I really think this was the only way.”

“Yeah,” Oikawa sniffles. “Yeah, I know.” There’s a beat. Then, quieter, “thanks for not actually murdering me.”

Kuroo laughs, and then coughs. And coughs. And _coughs_ , until suddenly he’s heaving and blood spills up past his lips. Oikawa stares in horror, and suddenly, as his boyfriend wretches in his arms, he’s filled with _rage_.

He can feel every moment of fear and pain in Kuroo’s body as he sucks it in like a drug, his nails sharpening and his eyes bleeding into a violent crimson. He feels like he’s drifting away on a tide as he reaches out a hand and rests his palm on Kuroo’s forehead, draining what’s left of the vampire’s conscious emotion. 

“Rest,” he whispers as Kuroo goes boneless. He stands, Kuroo dangling in his arms like some sort of grotesque doll. His clothing slowly shifts as he fades into his true form, his shirt sleeves lengthening and his pants billowing out. A cape flutters at his shoulders, weightless.

“O-Oikawa?”

A demon stands nearby, leaning against a tree. He seems to be injured. _Legion_.

“No,” he whispers. And he isn’t. Oikawa Tooru rests with his lover in a faraway place.

No, he is not Oikawa Tooru. And he isn’t some demon lord.

He is the King.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It’s like there’s ice in his veins. Frozen hands curl around his wrists like imprints of a ghost before shifting up his arms and resting at the base of his neck, squeezing just tight enough to remind him he’s still alive.

“Kenma,” he croaks. “Now.”

Kenma places a hand, oddly warm, on his own briefly while passing by. Futakuchi doesn’t see him go, can only stare as he fights the darkness creeping over him and watches his loved ones mangle her misshapen body.

“Holy _shit_ —“

Akaashi Keiji. Of course he followed them; the witch has always been too nosy for his own good. Futakuchi would snarl for him to stay out of the way, but that’s a little difficult when he’s trying to fight the literal void of death ripping his memories to shreds.

Each time he sees them like this, he loses them a little more.

He can’t focus on anything. Suddenly Akaashi’s right there in front of him, hands on Futakuchi’s cheeks as he checks for signs of awareness. Futakuchi gives him a loopy grin. 

“You weren’t supposed to show up yet,” he slurs. Ghostly hands start to curl around his neck and head and Akaashi whispers something and they go away. “S’pposed to be with your boyfriends. Kuroo will—need—“ he grunts as his knees threaten to give way—“help.”

“I can’t help them if she wins,” Akaashi replies quietly. “How long can you hold this?.”

“It hurts,” Futakuchi whimpers. It shows just how far he’s gone that he doesn’t even feel embarrassed. “I don’t want to see them again.”

He tries not to look over the blurry scene happening over Akaashi’s shoulder. Tries not to look at his dead friends as they mangle her, Kenma locked in a battle of otherworldly magic. He looks terrifying, his eyes a bright yellow and his nails sharp as he claws into the underbelly of her magic and tears it apart. But Futakuchi can tell. This is draining him.

“ _Kenji!_ ” 

Was he asleep? Akaashi keeps slapping his cheeks and it stings.

“Stay with us,” the witch is saying. “Just a little longer. Okay? Okay? Futakuchi? Kenj—“

Everything goes dark.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kenma feels it when Futakuchi gives in to the darkness. She can too, but she’s too far gone to acknowledge it. Not with the way Kenma has her in an iron grip. 

“Why?” He grits. He’s standing not two feet from her as his old friends—his _dead_ friends—grapple with her limbs, twisting them like putty. He puts all his force into keeping her energy tied to this physical manifestation.

She hisses wordlessly and writhes in pain before letting out a bone-chilling scream. He has only moments before suddenly she’s throwing herself forward, her limbs too broken to function as she hobbles forward once and lunges. Her teeth sink into his shoulder and _rip_.

He can’t remember the last time he felt actual, physical injury. 

They fall to the ground, the dead bodies lumbering after them. Kenma quickly throws up a barrier—better not to get mixed up with them himself. He can’t avoid them and attack her at the same time, not like this.

He grabs her by the hair and pushes her away, and she takes a chunk of his flesh with her. He grimaces and takes count—he’ll probably be fine, it’s not like he bleeds anyhow—but it hurts. It _hurts_.

“Ow,” he grunts. She eyes him like a wild animal, still trying to find her footing even with her grotesque physique. It’s awful. He never wanted this, but—

Suddenly her teeth are against his neck again and everything is overwhelmed by _pain_. He thinks he screams but he can’t tell. He can hear Akaashi yelling in the background as strong magic—not strong enough, but still present—tries to pull her away. 

As he falls, he sees the witch running forward, hands shaking with exertion. He’ll lose his magic at the rate he’s burning it up. They both will.

Good. As he thought.

Just one more…

His vision darkens but he forces himself to stay conscious. He has to wait. He reaches out with his soul and bolsters Akaashi’s magic, keeping her contained as she writhes and slithers towards him on the ground. Her arms are too distorted to use.

“You will lose,” she hisses. “I will kill you. I will kill you! I will—“

_“Is that so?”_

Kenma smiles, just a little bit.

The King is here.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Bokuto finds Kuroo slumped between Tsukishima and Iwaizumi as the pair attempt to revive him. 

“Oh, god,” he chokes. “Tetsu. Tetsu, what did you do?”

No response. Iwaizumi has his hands on Kuroo’s stomach where a blade still sticks out, palms glowing yellow. There’s blood all over Kuroo’s chin and neck, and it’s terrifying. The angel looks grim.

“Bokuto,” he murmurs. “I’m sorry, but he might not have a lot of time left. If you want to talk to him…”

“NO!” Bokuto shouts, stumbling away. He trips over a root and falls to the ground, scratching up his palms. He can literally _hear_ Kuroo’s heartbeat slowing. “H-he just needs more blood! Why haven’t you given him more blood?!”

“He took some of mine before—well. He shocked his system. Any other drastic changes in his biology could kill him.”

Bokuto feels his shoulders start to shake as he crawls forward, leaning over his boyfriend and brushing the vampire’s pale cheek.

“Kuroo,” he whispers. “Kuroo, buddy, please wake up.”

Nothing.  
“Please, Kuroo. We need you here. We need you down here. You gotta stay with us.”

He takes the stone and presses it to Kuroo’s heart and takes another shuddering breath. He flinches when a hand rubs over his spine, and glances up to see Tsukishima trying desperately to hold it together.

“I know,” the demon whispers to him. It’s true. Out of everyone—it’s. God, this is so awful. 

They mourn in silence as Bokuto listens to his lover’s heartbeat fade.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kenma wakes up to Akaashi dragging him by the feet and immediately struggles. Akaashi drops him.

“Sorry,” he says, “I didn’t think you were awake.”

Kenma doesn’t say anything, just looks around. Oikawa—no, the King—is several yards away, hacking violently away at what’s left of her body. It’s a rudimentary thing, to destroy a being as ancient as hers so thoroughly that she can’t regenerate, but he’s doing a splendid job of it.

“Tetsurou,” Kenma rasps. Akaashi’s face twists up in heartbreak as his breath catches.

“P-please,” the witch whispers. “Just let me pretend. For now.”

Ah. So he can sense it, then.

“Do you have magic left?” Kenma asks him. He shakes his head. “Close your eyes. Use your pack bond and urge Bokuto to bring him here.”

“But—“

“Quickly.”

Akaashi stares at him for a moment before finally saying, “Kenma, what _are_ you?”

Kenma doesn’t answer. He stares back evenly, then says, “quickly, Akaashi.”

Finally Akaashi relents, closing his eyes and holding his breath in concentration. It only takes moments before suddenly a swirl of dark mist, encompasses them, leaving Kuroo and his caretakers in its wake. Bokuto has Kuroo clutched to his chest, weeping into the vampire’s shoulder. Lucky that Tsukishima had enough energy to transport them all in one go.

“Oh, god—“ Akaashi cuts himself off to take a couple steps back and throw up.

“Bring him here,” Kenma rasps. “Grab Kenji.”

Iwaizumi seems to realize that he’s the only one ready to do _anything_ at the moment and stands, darting out into the clearing to retrieve the necromancer. Then he lays Futakuchi next to Kenma and coaxes Bokuto forward so that Kenma can hold his friend’s hand.

It’s strange. Kuroo still feels the way he always has.

_You need to come back now,_ Kenma thinks. _You’re needed here._

He closes his eyes. He doesn’t think he has enough power to do this, but with Futakuchi nearby he can use the last of his own and then some.

_I’m sorry I let you suffer_ , he thinks. And then he closes his eyes and lets go.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Oikawa comes to covered in blood. His nails are sharp and his pulse roars in his ears, and there are two strong arms trapping his own arms to his sides.

“Come back to us, Oiks,” comes a low voice. “Come on, Tooru, come back to me. He’s gonna be ok. He’s gonna be ok.”

“Kou?” He rasps. The arms tighten around him.

“Good to have you back. We thought we’d lost you to the King.” One of the arms covers his eyes just before he can get a bearing on his surroundings, and its a testament to their trust that Oikawa doesn’t freak out. “Shh, sorry. But you don’t—you don’t need to see this. Just keep your eyes closed, I’ll take you to everyone.”

“I feel so tired,” Oikawa croaks. Tears start to well up against the rough palm of Bokuto’s hand and the werewolf keens, drawing himself against his lover just a little tighter. 

“It’s ok. I got you. Just relax, Tooru. Just let go. I’m here. It’s ok.”

Oikawa takes a shuddering breath and then goes limp into his boyfriend’s arms. 

“Did we win?”

“Yeah, babe, we won. Just relax. Don’t think about that stuff right now.”

Bokuto starts to walk the back towards the others, keeping one arm firmly around Oikawa’s waist to guide him and his other hand shielding the demon’s eyes. 

“We love you,” Bokuto says. “So, so much. And I’m so glad you’re back.”

“Where did I go?”

Bokuto is quiet for a moment. As they stumble closer to the group, other sounds fill the air. Futakuchi’s rattling breaths. Kuroo’s faint heartbeat. The hum of angel magic combined with Akaashi’s nervous pacing.

He doesn’t tell Oikawa about how Bokuto had to _feel_ the bond rip as not one, but two lovers’ souls departed however briefly. He doesn’t say how excruciating it was to watch Kenma, a trusted ally, go limp as the core of his power, of his _being_ disappeared. How it felt in the bond to have Akaashi’s brilliant, lovely spark of magic fizzle out into nothingness.

He says nothing of the sort.

“Away,” he says softly. “You went away for a while. But now you’re here. And we’ll be ok.”

And they will be.

He’s certain of it.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

In the end, no one can walk back. Bokuto is the only one of them with the strength, and even he is tuckered out. He sits with Oikawa dozing in his arms, Akaashi and Tsukishima resting against his sides as he watches the others at work. Kuroo is…

Alive, at the very least. 

“Is he going to be—“ Tsukishima starts, then stops. His hands are still shaking, covered in blood from when he was doing chest compressions. There’s a nasty set of gashes over his forehead and cheeks. “Even if I-Iwaizumi manages to keep him a-alive, I think I b-broke h-h-his ribs—“

“Woah, hey,” Bokuto whispers, twisting so he can pull Tsukishima close up to Oikawa and himself. “Shh, he’s gonna be fine. You didn’t hurt him, you kept him alive enough to save him. You did everything you could.”

Tsukishima sniffles and doesn’t say anything else, so Bokuto raises a hand and rests it warmly on the demon’s neck to ground him.

“What should we do?” Iwaizumi asks, his glowing hands now pressed to separate bodies; one to Kuroo’s stomach, and one to Kenma’s head. “I mean, there’s no way Kuroo can travel like this. Carrying him such a long distance would definitely fuck up his stomach.”

“Tsukki?” Bokuto mumbles. The demon shakes his head.

“To drained. Couldn’t even take just me.”

Well, that’s that. 

“We could always—oh! Wait. I think know.”

Iwaizumi blinks. “You think you know someone can take us all back? A demon?”

“No, but I bet he can drive my truck over. There’s room for Tetsu to stay stretched out in the bed.”

And that is how, at five in the morning after hours of pain and heartache and sitting around in absolute shock, Bokuto phones a friend.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hanamaki rolls up only an hour later, when the moon is dipping down and the sky is turning its darkest shade just before dawn. His pink hair is easy to spot from the way the car light reflects off of it; he has one arm slung around an unconscious Kunimi’s shoulders to keep the demon upright. 

“Yo,” he drawls through the open window, “heard y’all needed a ride. Brought the kiddo along in case anyone dangerous came across the bakery.”

Kunimi looks better than he did before. Still pale and skinny, but at least no longer dead-looking. Bokuto’s glad.

“Yeah,” he says. “Thanks. I really owe you guys one, now.”

“Eh. Oiks ‘ll make it up for you when he helps out Kyoutani some more. Don’t worry about it.” The werewolf pulls the lever under the seat that helps release the bed of the truck, and Bokuto goes about waking up the others and helping Iwaizumi.  
“What’s going on?” Akaashi mumbles. His breath smells like ass. 

“You gotta hold onto Tooru for a second, ok?” Bokuto says. “I’ll come back for you two in a minute.”

Akaashi nods sleepily and rolls over to flop onto their boyfriend. Oikawa is totally dead to the world; doesn’t even react to it. Just lolls his head and settles in his breathing pattern. 

Bokuto spares them another glance before syncing up with Iwaizumi to lift their resident vampire. Kuroo feels terrifyingly light in his arms, bones hollow and old. Kenma’s eyes open and watch as they take Kuroo away, unseeing and unsettling. Frost crunches under Bokuto’s feet.

“It’s almost spring,” Iwaizumi says, sounding far away. His eyes are turned towards the moon, and in this light his wings almost appear to glow, pearlescent and beautiful.

“Almost,” Bokuto agrees. “But not quite.”

They carry the others in silence.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Sunlight. That’s the first thing Kuroo recognizes. It burns his eyelids bright red and makes him shrink back into whatever soft thing he’s laid on. 

So.

He didn’t die.

Isn’t that nice? He takes a moment to breathe before wiggling his fingertips. One of them brushes up against something else—skin? leather?—but whatever it is doesn’t shift. 

He remembers…Tooru. Oh, god, Tooru. And then not Tooru at all, but the Lord. And a sharp fear for Tsukishima, and realizing that something terrible was going to happen.

But he knows it in his gut.

It’s over.

He takes a deep, deep breath and feels the way his ribs sting as they expand. It’s…centering. This is still his body. It has all his wounds old and new, and he feels them because they are real. _He_ is real.

He just can’t believe he survived.

“Hey.”

His eyes snap open and he tries to get up, but his body doesn’t move. Akaashi sits in a brittle wooden chair off to the side. He’s looking—well, good. He’s got a mug in his hands, one of the thick-rimmed kinds only made by a potter’s crafty hands. His skin is clear of any sort of haggardness from the past weeks, and there’s a twinkle in his eye that Kuroo hadn’t realized was missing until now. His dark hair shines, clean and unkempt.

“You might have some difficulty speaking,” Akaashi says. “There was some damage to your lungs, somehow. I don’t really understand it all but Iwaizumi says it should be ok in a couple weeks at most.”

God, Kuroo loves him so much. Akaashi seems to pick up on that.

“I love you too,” he says calmly. “A lot’s changed since you—since that night. But don’t worry, I’ll catch you up.

“You have an anti-possession tattoo.” The witch doesn’t falter when Kuroo feels panic seize him. “I’m not angry. Yes, it would have prevented me from having a coven. But—Tetsurou, I’ve spent a lot of time being angry at people in my life. And yes, at first I was _furious_ even though I was so scared to lose you. But Oikawa doesn’t process things quietly like you do, he has to talk it out. And—“ suddenly things feel very, very quiet—“I had no idea exactly how horrifying being controlled was for you. You seemed fine, so I just tried my best to keep an eye out and let you deal with it yourself. But you getting that tattoo—you didn’t do anything wrong. When I lost my coven, I studied and worked and gave myself the power to protect the people I love. This doesn’t seem much different from that, in the end.

“Besides, none of that really matters anymore. Because—well. Because I don’t have magic.”

Kuroo’s head snaps to the side as he gapes, and the wi—man’s expression turns rueful.

“Yeah, I know. Turns out trying to use magic on an ancient being thousands of times stronger than you isn’t the greatest idea.”

Kuroo’s eyes widen to an impossible degree. “You—“ he croaks, then lags into a coughing fit. Akaashi nods.

“Yes. I saw her. I was there when Kenma defeated her. It was…not great. Futakuchi’s a necromancer so none of it was pleasant for anyone, I think. He really didn’t cope well at first. I didn’t realize how dark a necromancer’s powers really are until I saw them in action.

“Oh, and Kunimi’s better now. He’s…different. But Kenma helped us bring him back, and Tooru helped him heal. Would you like to see him?”

“Net yet,” Kuroo rasps. Akaashi smiles.

“I thought not. That’s fine. Tooru and Koutarou would love to see you too, but they let me have the first chat. I hope that’s ok. I’m going to let Futakuchi and Iwaizumi fuss over you for a while, and then one of them will come next. Ok?”

Kuroo nods, and Akaashi draws forward and presses a kiss to his forehead. “It’s ok, Tetsu. You’re safe. I love you.”

_I love you._

The words burn in his throat.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kenma comes in next, despite what Akaashi says. His eyes are dark and his hair darker. It needs to be re-bleached, Kuroo thinks.

“You came back,” Kenma says. His eyes dart around the room before settling on Kuroo’s throat. “I have no power now.”

“Wow,” Kuroo croaks. That’s all he can really say.

Wow. Fuck, what now?

“Thank you. I’ve waited a very, very long time for this day.”

“Sorry.”

“That’s ok.” A very small, intimate smile comes over Kenma’s face. “I like waiting.”

Kuroo eyes his friend. His best friend. 

The King of Hell. The King of Kings. Kuroo’s not too sure how that works, what with the demon lords and the angels and heaven and earth. Maybe demons aren’t related to Hell?

“I was Judgement,” Kenma answers him. “And then, I was Executioner.”

Well, that clears up nothing.

They share a grin. 

“This is for you.” Kenma hands him a sheet of paper. “My resignation. I thought you would appreciate the dramatics if I made it official.”

Kuroo lets out a huff of a laugh and nods. “Figured.”

“I’ll still visit.”

“Good.”

But they both know. This is the last time they’ll see each other for a very, very long time.

“I have to go now,” Kenma says. “Thank you.” He reaches out and holds Kuroo’s hand for a stretch. “I will never care about another person the way I care about you.”

“I know,” Kuroo laughs, and it breaks into a pained wheeze. “Go.”

“I love you, you big idiot.”

_I know_ , Kuroo thinks. But he’s having trouble finding the breath for that many words and settles for another—

“Go.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

In the end, Bokuto doesn’t even end up saying anything. He just comes in with a plate of toast and shuffles so that they’re spooning on the little bed, eating toast and getting crumbs all over each other. 

Oikawa doesn’t come at all that day.

Or the next.

Or the next.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

“You know,” Kuroo says, “I think if you guys keep doing this Futakuchi will have an aneurism.”

He sits and watches as five guilty, molting angels shuffle around the room leaving feathers in their wake. It makes Kuroo want to sneeze.

“Kei told me you guys are the ones that made it possible for Tooru to come back,” he says when they don’t respond. “Thanks for that. Seriously.”  
“It was no problem!” Screeches the smallest one. She’s barely comparable to Hinata in height, and dwarfed by Kageyama who prowls around next to her. Her short blonde hair is tied up in short pigtails; it’s pretty cute. 

“Man, you guys are multiplying,” he laughs. “Next thing you know there’ll be too many angels to fit in our home.”

But that’s ok, he thinks with a grin. 

He likes it that way.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Kuroo is well enough now to get up and move around on his own. He’s officially established that he’s at the bakery-bar. Futakuchi’s. Whatever. Oikawa still hasn’t seen him.

It’s ok, though. Kuroo has a good idea why.

He ends up seeking out the demon himself. It’s early, the sun just rising. Futakuchi’s started his first batch of rolls in the bakery part of the building, having awoken much earlier. The others are mostly gone now. Kunimi has taken to going back to the house to maintain it on the days he doesn’t spend resting with Kuroo. 

He finds Oikawa sitting on the back porch to the bar, sitting in an old wood rocking chair and nursing a cup of tea. Futakuchi’s done a proper job of getting them all addicted to his trade, that’s for sure.

“So,” Kuroo says, leaning against the doorframe. “What’s a vampire gotta do to see his favorite boyfriend?”

Oikawa jumps and spills tea all over his sweatpants, and instinctively twists around in the chair to glare at Kuroo. The glare fades into guilt quickly enough, and the brunette turns back around and sighs. 

“Oh, shut up. I had to sort myself out first, you know that.”

“Yeah,” Kuroo says. “But it would’ve been nice to see you after all this time. I missed you like hell. It wasn’t fair to me to do that.”

Oikawa’s expression falters and then melts as he hurries to his boyfriends side and collapses in a hug.   
“No,” he murmurs. “It wasn’t. I’m sorry.”

“Forgiven,” Kuroo grins. “So, tell me. I wanna know all about these new angels. Did you see the little blonde one, Yachi? How long has she been in the flock? And what about Yahaba and Kyoutani, don’t think I didn’t notice the pack coming and going. You’re helping Kyoutani now that you’re apparently _King_ , right?” He laughs at Oikawa’s dumbfounded look. “Come on. Akaashi hates gossip and Bokuto has a short attention span. I know you’re _dying_ to have someone to dish to.”

Suddenly Oikawa lurches forward again, and the force of this hug makes Kuroo stumble back with a wheezed chuckle. A long time passes before Oikawa leans back and searches Kuroo’s face.

“I love you,” he says very seriously.

“Love you too. Idiot.”

They laugh.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It’s been nearly a week since Futakuchi Kenji had e-fucking-nough and kicked them out of his bar so he could resume, you know, _making a living wage_. He’s still got his work cut out for him with preparing the bar for use again, but goodness knows he’s short staffed as it is. Can’t afford to take anyone from the cafe, and the town is small as fuck.

Still, he can’t help but enjoy this. Kenma’s gone, which—well, it sucks, it’s lonely—has left Futakuchi feeling…peaceful? There’s no sick, soulless demons in his spare room or hungry wolves eating him out of his day-old pastries. No witches nosying around to learn difficult mixology, or angels giving him weird rants about the bible. 

It’s peaceful. 

He likes it.

Really.

“Ugh,” he growls, slamming the dough onto the counter and taking a beat. “Fuck! Why do I—ugh. God, Kenma, you know this would happen you shitstain.”

He can’t handle being alone with his gross thoughts anymore so he abandons his dough to rise in the proving drawer and heads up front only to find a lag in customers. Everyone’s been helped, it seems, and all the workers he chats with up front are busy bussing dishes and counting tips.

Welp.

He turns to go back to the baking area and almost runs into someone.

“Holy motherfucker don’t sneak up on me like that!” He hisses. Kunimi blinks slowly back at him.

The kid looks a lot better. That much, at least, puts Futakuchi at ease.

“What are you even doing here?” The baker asks wearily, watching as the demon shrugs and moves out of the way.

“Want a job.”

Futakuchi frowns. “Well, I’m not here with handouts if that’s what you’re looking for.”

“Need a job. I need something to do to feel—to—“ Kunimi bites his lip. “I can’t just hang around the house all day and do nothing.”

_Well_ , Futakuchi thinks. _Looks like being under her control made him a lot more subservient than they realized._ He can’t recall the demon ever doing anything except lay around and cook food before this week.

“Please?” Kunimi asks again, his eyes going wide and pleading. “Tooru promised he’d help out with the bar if you do.”

“Ugh,” Futakuchi groans again. “Fine.”

This is going to be _such_ a _pain_.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

_After._

A crisp breeze tumbles through the station cafe, bringing with it gray skies and a calming drizzle of rain. Flowers bloom from the trees surrounding the structure, and Kenma watches them from his seat. A petal floats down, small and light enough to be shifted around by the wind even after it lands, skating across the brick patio.

He has been waiting a very, very long time for this.

Tracks stretch in either direction, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out where they go.  
“You’re late,” he murmurs to the empty air, but that’s fine.

It’s not like he knows what will be. Not anymore. Instead he leans back, takes a sip of tea, and enjoys the passing of the time.

“Yo~” 

Kuroo grins down at him, leaning over from behind. He looks—good. Aged well. There are gray streaks in his hair for a moment, but then Kenma blinks and they’re gone. The vampire—man, now, Kenma supposes—wears a nice black suit with grey stripes and a smooth black tie, stark against his white button-down shirt.

“I know,” Kuroo singsongs, slipping into an adjacent chair, “I look really classy, now, don’t I? Aged like fine wine. The makeup artist they hired was phenomenal, of course.”

“You’re late,” Kenma sniffs, rolling his eyes. “They’re waiting for you.”

Kuroo’s eyes soften into something wonderful, and he smiles true. “Wow,” he sighs dreamily, “I can’t wait to see them again.”

“It’s not like it’s been a long time for any of you,” Kenma reminds him.

“Nah, but even a year or two feels like a millenia.” 

“I’m sure. Well, I’m glad I can be here.”

They sit there in the quiet for a moment and watch the cherry blossoms drift down around them. The petals coat the train tracks in a beautiful white. And while Kenma loves waiting, the time for that is over.

Kuroo gives him a fond look and stands, reaching out his arm.

“Shall we?” He asks.

They leave together.

**Author's Note:**

> wowowowww
> 
> please let me know what you think!!! it's sad that this is over, but the time has come. i've been planning this series out for years!
> 
> i really struggled with this ending, but after five different rehauls i'm happy with this one.
> 
> ps your comments give me life


End file.
